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COPi'RIGHT DEPOSIT. 



FANCIES AND THOUGHTS 
IN VERSE 

BY 

AUGUSTUS GEORGE HEATON 




BOSTON 

The Poet Lore Company 
1904 



THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED TO MY 
THREE SONS 






.^^ 



AUGUSTUS, HARRY AND PERRY 
HEATON 

WITH PRIDE IN THEIR CHARACTER 
AND CAPACITY, JOY IN THEIR LOVE, 
AND TPIE HOPE THAT WHAT IS BEST 
IN MY VERSE MAY BE AS BENEFICIAL 
A LEGACY TO THEIR MINDS AS THAT 
OF MY MATERIAL POSSESSIONS CAN 
BE TO THEIR COMFORT AND WORLDLY 

WELFARE. : - : - : - 



LIBRARY of congress] 


Two Copies 


Keceived 


FE8 4 


1905 


CiukSS O^ AXc. Not 

/ Of o^y 

COPY B. 



Entered according to Act of Congress in the year 1904 by 
Augustus George Heaton in the ofBce of the Librarian of Con- 
gress at Washington. 



Printed at Th? Qcrham Press, Boston. U. S. A. 



PREFACE 

The author has during forty years been pub- 
licly occupied as an artist but, in his private life, 
poetry has for as long a period almost equally 
interested him. Of a strongly sentimental na- 
ture, his earlier paintings reflected it, but, after 
producing a number of real life and historical 
subjects during long residence abroad, some of 
which were exhibited at the Paris Salon and 
many in various cities of this country (his best 
known picture being "The Recall of Columbus" 
at the Capitol in Washington and engraved on 
the 50 cent Columbian postage stamp), he gave 
time mainly to portraiture and then found increas- 
ing pleasure in a fuller expression of thought and 
fancy than this art or, indeed, any branch of 
painting permits. 

Little of his writing was, however, offered 
for publication until, contrary to general pre- 
cedent, his most ambitious work appeared in 
1900 in the form of an epic entitled "The Heart 
of David, the Psalmist King." This has since 
met with such high commendation and his 
friends have so often desired many of his shorter 
poems in book form, that he here commits to 
type a number of compositions as wide in range 
of subject and mood as in poetic worth. 

Covering as they do, however, impressions 
of nature, promptings of imagination, early ro- 
mantic emotions, sympathetic and religious feel- 
ing, art reveries, patriotic sentiment and humor- 
ous impulses, it is hoped that even the chance 
reader may find some pages of interest. 

But, whether the collection win general favor 



or not, the author will be gratified if, to the loy- 
alty of friends possessed, he may from time to 
time, by means of but a few of the poems, add 
the kind regard of readers, seen or unseen, who 
base affinity upon earnestness of heart, sympathy 
in culture and aspiration and a sincerity and in- 
tegrity of purpose that make life superior to 
cares, sorrows, narrow natures, or sordid pleas- 
ures and bring the truest and most enduring 
happiness. 

Washington, D. C, 1904. 



CONTENTS 

Poems of General Sentiment ... ii 

Poems of the Sea 32 

Poems OjF Place 48 

Poems on Love 89 

Poems to the Fair Sex, Including Imi- 
tations OF Burns 102 

Poems Relating to the Art of Painting 133 
Poems of Religion, Morality, Sorrow 

AND Serious Feeling 158 

Poems of Patriotism 183 

Humorous and Lighter Verse^ Includ- 
ing Numismatic Verse .... 196 

POEMS OF GENERAL SENTIMENT. 

To a Butterfly 11 

The Bat 12 

The Old Bed 15 

Compensation 16 

A Spark of Feeling 18 

Two Marriages 19 

In Office 21 

The Rhythm of a Ride 25 

The Rain that Falls at Night .... 28 

On a Sheet of Paper 29 

Little Visitors ........ 30 

Happy Moments 31 

POEMS OF THE SEA. 

A Song by the Sea 32 

On the Atlantic 33 

Faithful Ships of the Day 33 

A Ship on the Starboard Bow .... 34 

Lonely Ocean 35 

5 



A SHEAF OF SONNETS. 

The Poet's Heart 37 

The Poet's Mission 37 

Great Minds . 38 

Nature's Noblemen 39 

Cobden and Bright 39 

Queen Marguerite 40 

On a Book of Poems 40 

The Eve of a Century 41 

Fancy, Fact and Faith 41 

The Fire of Ambition 42 

The Critic 42 

The Spendthrift 43 

The Craven World 43 

Compass Variations 44 

Lost Friendship 44 

Heart Cherished Ones 45 

Proven Friends 45 

To a Maple Tree 46 

The Orchid 46 

The Lily 47 

POEMS OF PLACE. 

Memories of Italy 48 

Pasadena 63 

The Prairie 65 

Catskill Mountains 67 

On an Adirondack Lake 71 

Duddington 73 

Mountain Life 76 

Indian Rock, a Nocturne yj 

A Welcome to Indian Rock .... 80 

The Lodge of Heatonawa 83 

An Old Virginia Estate. Sonnet ... 86 

The White City. Sonnet 87 

Granada. Sonnet 87 

Yellowstone Park. Sonnet 88 

6 



POEMS ON LOVE. 

The Melody of Love. Sonnet .... 89 

Music of the Wind 89 

Love Growth. Sonnet 90 

Love, Sonnet 90 

The Dawn of Love 91 

The Castle of Love 92 

Love Reigns 93 

The Island of Love 94 

Love in Sorrow. Sonnet 97 

Consolation 97 

The Love of the Immortal ..... 98 

POEMS TO THE FAIR SEX. 

A Song to Nine 102 

What is There More to Say? .... 103 

To a Pretty Girl 104 

Beautiful Girls 105 

Where is the Bird I Gave, Love ? . . . 106 

For Company's Sake . . . . . . . 107 

Rifts of the Lute . 108 

Jealousy 108 

A Rose of Herculaneum 109 

No Greater Joy '. . iii 

Sea Dreams 112 

To a Fair Fellow Traveller 112 

To an Ideal 113 

Love in Absence 115 

My Spirit of Sunshine 115 

Tell Me You Love Me 116 

The Diamond Necklace 116 

Sub Rosa 117 

Slumber Song 118 

Of Poems to a Friend. Sonnet . . . 119 

In Honor of a Fair Friend. Sonnet . . 119 

Heart Weather. Sonnet . . . . . 120 

Beautiful Eyes. Sonnet 120 

To a Mexican Brunette. Sonnet . . . 121 

7 



To an Artist's Daughter. Sonnet . . . 121 

To a Young Actress. Sonnet . . . . 122 

Lines Introducing an Authoress . . . 122 

The Coquette. A rondeau 123 

Play, For I Would Dream 123 

A Hidden Song Bird 124 

To Miss Gertrude Griswold in "Hamlet" . 125 

To Emma Nevada in "The earl of Brazil" 126 

To a Louisiana Soprano. Sonnet • . . 127 

To a Brooklyn Choir Singer. Sonnet . 127 

IMITATIONS OF BURNS. 

A' Partin' Frae My Dearie 128 

A Gash wi' the Moon 129 



POEMS RELATING TO PAINTING. 

Memories of Art Student Life in Paris 

Sketch Qub Song 

First Meeting of the Cradle Club, Paris 
To a Summer Companion . 
Peter Paul Rubens. Sonnet . 
Ideal and Reality .... 
Barren Technique. Sonnet 
The Apostles of Art. Sonnet . 
Beauty's Gift to Art . . . . 



133 
136 

137 
140 
140 
141 
142 
142 
143 



POEMS OF RELIGION, SORROW AND 
SERIOUS FEELING. 

A Mountain Hymn 158 

The Better Offering 159 

Cheer Thee, Doubtful Pilgrim .... 160 

The Sweeter Rest 161 

Rocking the Cradle 162 

Generosity 162 

A Charming Sunday in December . . . 163 

The Goodness of Men 165 

8 



To Hope . i68 

No King But Caesar 169 

The Arena 170 

King David 171 

In Memory of M. T 171 

In Memory of C. E. M 172 

Life's Bravest .172 

How Long? 173 

Life's Crescendo 174 

Vicissitudes 174 

"Follow Thou Me" 175 

The Higher Love 176 

Soul Love 177 

Time's Corridor 178 

Perfection 179 

Nature's Gospel 179 

After Drought 180 

The True Trinity 180 

If I Were Judge 181 

Devotion 181 

Life Lingering 182 

To M. L. O . . . . 182 

POEMS OF PATRIOTISM. 

Stand by the Flag 183 

Patriotism 185 

Music of Freedom 189 

A Sigh in a Foreign Land 190 

Columbia's Night Watch 191 

The Fourteenth of July in Paris . . . 192 
The 1892 Grand Army Parade in Wash- 
ington 193 

HUMOROUS AND LIGHTER VERSE. 

A Summer Mishap 196 

Fumigation 198 

A Question of Temper 200 

The Yankee Twang 201 

9 



Adventures in Southern Spain and Tangier 203 
The Ear of Corn, a Fable for Children . . 205 
The Herd of Swine, a Satire . 
An American Girl's Mail in Paris 
To a Lively Girl in Paris . 

Midsummer 

The Herring and the Clam 
Woman's Strategy .... 



209 
212 
213 
214 
215 
215 



NUMISMATIC VERSE. 

The Amorous Numismatist .... 217 

A Miss Taken Scent 218 

The Old Lady We Know 219 

The Numismatist and the Burglar . . . 221 



10 



POEMS OF GENERAL SENTI- 
MENT 



TO A BUTTERFLY 

Jauntily floating butterfly, flitting from flower 
to flower, 
Lured by the brightest blossoms, sipping their 
hidden sweets, 
Oft do I watch thy vagaries during each sunny 
hour 
Spent in my garden's confines, fairest of all 
retreats. 

Whether of crimson panoply, whether of brown 
or blue. 
Or of a Spanish splendor, orange and bor- 
dered black. 
Still in a vaunted rivalry with every petal's hue. 
Art thou the zephyr riding, free in thy care- 
less track. 

Now in thy light winged wandering dost thou 
a feast survey. 
Now in a blushing flower pry for its nectar 
deep, 
Then, as in airy bantering, circle with friends at 
play 
Or, as with pleasure sated, linger in seeming 
sleep. 

What are thy jocund reveries, king of the in- 
sect host. 
Hast thou a care or a longing in thy existence 
bright, 
Mute in thy outer loveliness, knowest thou in its 
boast 
Danger of feathered foemen, hours of damp 
and night? 

II 



Heir of a worm made glorious, symbol of hu- 
man fame, 
Spirit of wayward fancy, hast thou a joy com- 
plete. 
Or is thy day a sophistry, fate in its end the 
same 
Whether we soar exultant or journey on 
weary feet? 

Lo! Mid my idle questioning, suddenly wings 
are spread, 
Gaily thy course is taken over my garden wall, 
Thus full many a rhapsody out of my life has 
sped. 
Thus full many a day dream passeth beyond 
recall. 
Indian Rock, 1901. 



THE BAT 

In my cottage garden musing, 
I partake the twilight's peace. 
Every care of day refusing 
As the throbs of labor cease 
And the balms of night increase. 
Every ill of life excusing — 
What is that 

Thing of darkness near me gliding. 
Gone as quickly into hiding 
As I shudder? 'Tis a bat, 
Noiseless in its apparition 
As some terrible suspicion 
That, despite the heart's deriding. 
Swoops and leaves a scar behind. 
Hateful as some vicious slander 
That the tongues of cravens pander. 
What have I for sad contrition? 
Why should I a moment mind? 

12 



There, against the sky apparent, 
Now it mocks at greater distance 
And I smile, for malice errant 
Far removed dispels resistance. 
Wherefore grudge it then existence, 
This small whim of nature trying 
Antics in the art of flying? 
But a mouse on wings, says fancy, 
Revelling in speed ecstatic. 
Not an imp of necromancy. 
Lo, it whirls in course erratic, 
Dodging, flapping and careering 
In its frenzy acrobatic, 
Then as mutely disappearing. 
Why should still some apprehension 
Trouble now my twilight dreams? 
Rest in vain the day redeems 
With my mind in anxious tension 
From this mad-cap intervention. 
Get thee hence. Again it dashes. 
That winged fiend oi maniac daring. 
Close athwart my blinking lashes. 
Silent as a dread unsparing 
When the heart gains no replying 
As some love of youth seems dying. 
What ! again ? Thou black defiance, 
Wierdly noiseless persecutor, 
Wouldst thou by thine onsets banish 
Even such a patient suitor 
For repose, when thou art flying? 
Then, since all my pleasures vanish, 
I must yield thy spite compliance. 
Lo, I go within my dwelling 
That, all worriment dispelling, 
I may find no peace denying 
While I muse of life's true living 
Over selfishness of men, 
Of the greater good of giving 

.13 



Than receiving bounty when — 

Evil creature, still pursuing, 

By what cleft hast thou invaded 

My retreat, to thy undoing 

In thy flight no longer shaded, 

In each dizzy perihelion? 

Night-begotten winged chameleon. 

Now beware, amid thy swooping 

And thy vibrant corner looping 

Or thy zigzag speed bewildered. 

For the light is on thee shining. 

Hellish things in such confining 

Ever seek escape unhindered. 

Ah, at length thine end seems certain. 

Dashing at the window curtain, 

Thou hast struck the sash and tumbled, 

All thy frantic being shaken. 

Writhing, flapping, yet unhumbled, 

Hissing wrath, though all forsaken. 

Demon, at my mercy lying. 

Shall revenge be quickly taken? 

Shall I see thee bleeding, dying 

'Neath my heel? Nay, for a better 

Spirit makes thy evil debtor 

To its more exalted mission 

And, in fuller recognition 

Of my musing, by the^ broken, 

Do I, by a 'kerchief trailing, 

Lift thee, in thy rage unfailing. 

And unto the doorway bear thee 

To thy freedom, as a token 

Of the nature that should spare thee 

E'en to life of darkness, knowing 

There is joy about me glowing 

Due to no shame for thy spite 

But to guiding inner light. 

Then, in higher restoration 

Of true faith, I sit confiding 

14 



That all baseness of creation, 
Large or least abomination, 
Cannot harm, with good abiding. 
1903. 

THE OLD BED 

Listen, dear son, when I was wed. 

Scarce out of girlhood made a wife, 
My father gave this ample bed 

With other bounties to my life. 
Though little did I need to rest 
, With every wakeful hour so blest. 

My bed, in ripening season, knew 
The daily strife of fear and joy. 

And gave, one morning, to my view. 
Thy ruddy little face, my boy. 

And thou didst cry with such a zest 

And nip so tightly at my breast ! 

Time flew apace, and love bestowed 
Full many a test of family care. 

Yet morning mirth and health o'er-flowed 
The midnight watch and silent prayer 

As oft fair forms like flowers o'er-spread 

And clustered 'round their natal bed. 

Then Fortune marked thy father's toil 
And humored quickly each desire. 

The city's best became our spoil. 
Full many sought our glowing fire. 

And this old bed, in high disgrace. 

Gave to a modern couch its place. 

The fire went out. The fortune flew 
And men went elsewhere to be warm. 

Our pomp of life, as well you knew. 
Was sold to weaken trouble's storm, 

But my old bed regained its right 

To soothe us many an anxious night. 

15 



Then came a time of bitter woe, 
Your father took his final sleep. 

The house was dark, the prayer was low 
And some true friends came there to weep 

Until the bed my loved one gave 

To lonely slumber in the grave. 

Oh, sacred scene of death and birth, 
Of joy and pain, of praise and prayer, 

Of each loved infant's tender mirth, 
Of visions stretching everywhere, 

Of sweet repose and loving vow, 

How should I wish to spare thee now? 

I care not if the bed's design 

Makes it the greed of lavish taste, 

If yielding it would bring as mine 

Fair gold out-poured from fashion's waste. 

To me a deeper worth precedes 

The whim of taste, the moment's needs. 

For on it have I learned to know 
Life's truest joys and sweetest rest. 

To measure not by wealth or show 
Our true desires and motives best, 

So in its comfort let me spend 

My nights until fatigue shall end. 

Denver, Col., 1880. 



COMPENSATION 

A farmer sighed one summer morn, 
As to the field he bent his way, 

That he was to its labor born 

Throughout each heat pervaded day, 

16 



That, to his little ones endow 
And cherish well his loving wife, 

He needs must guide the delving plough 
In weariness of subsoil strife, 

Must watchful serve, as rain or sun 
Aided or harmed the sower's care. 

And long maintain the war begun 
With pigmy foes of earth and air. 

He reached a field of wheat that stood 

As lances of a countless host 
And gaily bid him call it good 

And far exceeding labor's cost. 

But sullenly he made reply, 

"Your tribute is but barely just. 

What bounty here can gratify 

The toil that raised you from the dust?" 

"Ah," sang the wheat, "we yield to thee 
Full harvest measure, and beside 

Give of our blessings gladfully, 

That grace may in thy fields abide." 

The musing farmer looked again 
And lo, like silken banners spread, 

Were flowers in the hosts of grain 
That gratefully their perfume shed. 

Then came the lesson to his heart 
That, though monotonous or mean. 

If toils were met in noble part 

Unplanted joys would grow between; 

That duties manfully sustained. 

Though long withholding fruitful yield, 

17 



Held present pleasures freely gained 
By those who stooped in life's rich field. 

Thus viewed, the farmer's cares grew light, 
New zeal controlled the day's hot hours 

And, when he sought his home at night. 
His arms were full of nodding flowers. 

Philadelphia, 1870. 



A SPARK OF FEELING 

"Will you oblige me with a light?" 
"Boss, will you give a man some fire?" 

Thus high or low a boon invite 

And pure "Havana" meets with "briar. 

The soothing leaf the red man found 
Thus still a peaceful influence yields 

And gives a moment's neutral ground 
To men in life's apportioned fields. 

The rich forgets his studious pride, 
The poor his humble fate or shame 

As, standing briefly side by side. 

They ask and grant the needed flame. 

A moment only serves, alas, 
This little courtesy of mankind. 

And then upon their way they pass. 
Oblivious one and one resigned. 

Yet hath the act its little good. 

The poor man feels a touch of cheer. 

And he who bends from wealth or blood 
A sense of better influence near. 

The giver, howe'er poor he be, 
Gives freely, yet his boon retains, 

18 



A paradox of charity 

The generous heart in all explains. 

And the receiver, pleasure free 
If fortune smiles in lapse of care, 

Plucks flowers of serenity 

From' furrows cut by ruder share. 

Would that the spark of kindly grace 

'Twixt man and man could spread as far 
And cheer as many a weary face 
As doth the light of one cigar. 
Washington, 1885. 



TWO MARRIAGES 

A guest tonight with the husband sits 

And the wife has left in scorn ; 
The fire up from its prison flits, 
The wine need brighten the hale guest's wits, 

For the host abides forlorn. 

The wife doth long in her chamber wait 

While she sharpens darts of blame 
That one should talk with her lord so late 
As friend who, careless of social state. 
Had married "beneath his name." 

Alone she goes to her couch so wide 

As the hours pass away, 
Brooding in woman's wealth wrought pride, 
The while her husband must groan aside. 

Though the guest at heart is gay. 

They sit together who first had met 

In the flush of freer life, 
When every art of the world beset 
Their course, enlisted betimes to get 

For them each an heiress-wife. 

19 



But all its craft to their eyes became 

As a snare, a loveless crime, 
And, holding not its decoys in blame, 
They waited yet for a fuller flame. 

And the sophist world its time. 

Full oft men, guarding with shields aibove. 

Can be smitten deep below. 
Two sisters chanced in their path to move, 
They followed, knew them, at length, to love; 

Ah! Why should the sophists know? 

Fair sisters, passing the weary day 
In a wealthy tradesman's store, 
Together glad, on their homeward way. 
To talk of men who had pledged faith's sway. 
Whom they dared to love the more ; 

Had dared to love in their hearts' great need 

Of a shield from worldly harm, 
As orphans left of a house decreed, 
Despite its honor of name and deed, 

To crumble at fate's alarm. 

A year sped on, but their tired feet 

Could no more together wend, 
For one in loving was indiscreet .... 
The host was not in the narrow street 

At a death bed few attend. 

He sought again the distracting thrall 

That fashion gives its slave, 
He wed an heiress, of blood withal, 
He asked the world to his feast and ball, 

And the smiling world forgave. 

The guest was mourner with her who wept 

For a sister's early death. 
A year crept on, as his fortune crept, 

20 



And then in marriage he "downward stepped," 
As the world said, under breath. 

Love graced the home of the wedded guest 

And it healed his dear wife's heart, 
But wedded host in his soul's vain quest 
For joy was scourged to his manhood's best 
And he sought his guest apart. 

Tonight they sit by the fire late, 

Musing of passion's cost. 
The guest, relenting, has buried hate 
Of a broken heart that bewails the fate 

Of one deceived and lost. 



The heiress turns, as she restless sleeps. 

With a smile upon her face; 
She dreams her husband no longer keeps 
His caller welcome, but proudly heaps 

On him taunts of his disgrace. 

She little knows that the old friend came 

With a pardon full instead. 
She little thinks that the pretty name 
Her daughter bears is, by choice, the same 

As the name of one long dead. 

Philadelphia, 1868. 



IN OFFICE 

CONCERNING WOMEN IN GOVERNMENT EMPLOY 
IN WASHINGTON 

We see a maiden gay and fair. 

The sun hides in her wavy hair. 

The hope of life is in her face, 

The strength of Spring bestows its grace 

21 



To slender form and nimble feet, 
Her voice is gleeful, clear and sweet 
And, prompted by a cultured brain, 
Has made each knotty question vain. 
So, passing with ingenuous smile 
The censor's test, the city's guile, 
She hastens lightly on her way. 
Making her daily task a play. 
With nimble fingers gleaning more 
Of comfort for the household store. 
God bless the schoolmates who may still 
From ease and affluence fulfil 
The pledges of affection made 
In innocence of social grade 
And fashion's inquisition false, 
Inviting her to feast and waltz, 
And guarding, in hard care's despite, 
Her equal claim to youth's delight. 

II 

VVe see her young and lovely yet 

But haunted by some dim regret. 

The eye is softer in its glance 

And gazes from a yearning trance 

Of sympathetic womanhood, 

A longing for the perfect good 

And joy of living. From her lips 

Of tender will less often slips 

The chime of laughter, and she moves 

Along the world's contracting grooves 

With quieter and surer tread 

And nobler grace. The upright head 

And rounded outline, full and fair 

Of just proportion, scorning care, 

Saving, at times, when petty toil 

At humble duty seems to foil 

An orphan's resolution high 

And mark the hours with a sigh. 

22 



God bless the hero young and brave 
Who has the wealth or will to save 
The treasures of so deep a love 
And full a beauty and, above 
The web of care, to lift her feet 
To happiness and leisure sweet, 
That all the fickle throng may see 
True virtues win their dignity. 



Ill 

We see her once again, but now 

The lady has a sadder brow. 

Spanned by a hueless arch above. 

The symbol of a widowed love, 

The token of a broken bliss 

And the long interrupted kiss 

Of gracious fortune, once so kind. 

Through sweet and patient eyes the mind 

Discloses an abandoned trust 

In life's ambitions, for the rust 

Of calculating greed has fed 

On honor's tears and overspread 

Hopes of an alloy once so bright. 

Yet, happily, at times, the light 

Of these soft eyes gives greeting due 

To courteous act or converse true. 

The clear fair skin takes back again 

Some happy color and the pain 

And weariness which linger nigh 

Her miserable drudgery 

Are half forgotten for a while 

If kindly mirth restore a smile ; 

A smile to lips which long ago 

Had said to many a suitor "No," 

To all but one, whose toiling hand 

And brain had taught her to command 

23 



Until misfortune, death and need 
Compelled her, hardly heard, to plead. 
God bless the man of place and power 
Who guards for her toil's scanty dower 
And honors with as high a heart 
This lady in life's humble part 
As any woman blessed by fate 
Whom fortune strives to satiate 
With wealth undue and courted leisure, 
Who wearies but from taxing pleasure. 
God bless those women rare who prove 
Their right to riches in their love 
For her who, having fully known 
Abundance, striveth now alone. 
Who, could the truth be told aloud, 
Is least unworthy to be proud. 



IV 

At last we see her old and gray. 
This toiler in the nation's pay. 
Complying, like a child at school, 
With each obligatory rule 
Of discipline, each daily share 
Of toil with humble nervous care. 
Her hands may tremble, it is true, 
And dimness sometimes cross her view, 
Or some unsoothed coug"h or pain 
The measure of endurance drain, 
But she can bravely struggle yet 
Above the cramping waves of debt. 
And, with a quick pathetic pride. 
Rejoice that no one need provide 
Her bread or shelter. Not in vain. 
Perchance was son or husband slain 
In war, or lost upon the sea 
To leave a pleading memory, 

24 



For still she holds her place content 
And, when the weary week is spent, 
She dreams, in sacred music's peace. 
Of realms where toil and pain shall cease 
And hears a voice as from her home, 
"Ye blessed of my Father come 
Unto a place of joy secure 
To heavy ladened, meek and pure," 
Where, welcoming at open gates. 
The "Chief" among ten thousand waits. 

Washington, D. C, 1887. 



THE RHYTHM OF A RIDE 

Mounted well for a country ride, 
Kate and I from the stable start, 

"Prince" her courser and "Chief" my pride 
Know the ways that we take by heart 

And snort impatiently as we go 

Along the pavement in progress slow. 

Out in the course of the wider street. 
Persons from mansion and alley stare. 

Think not, ye poor, our joy unmeet. 

Ye rich, that your languor we yearn to share. 

As we give our horses a freer rein 

And the pure air greets our faces again. 

Then, as the verdant park appears. 
Our steeds alert, with quicker pace. 

Trot on where all the vision cheers 
And, taking in the throng our place. 

We scan the gay and glittering line 

Where countless masquerades combine. 

Here meet we and salute a friend. 
With mirthful comment, passing by, 

25 



There, though distracted, scarce attend 

A dozen more. With glancing eye 
Each equipage we briefly see 
And then forget for that to be. 

Oh ! labyrinth of flashing wheels, 
Of colors bright and trappings new, 

How high the heart of pleasure feels 
As all the pageant we review, 

Of beauty flushed and gallant pride, 

Of pomp and envy, side by side. 

How swift the whirl of thought between 
The saddened gaze of age or care 

And tender childhood's merry mien, 
The dame serene, the millionaire 

Of brooding face ; from grave to sweet, 

Life's myriad moods our glances meet. 

Yet oft the world's bedecked parade 

Fills wearily the constant sight, 
Its drift unchanged, its charms displayed 

Monotonously, pall delight 
And, seeking not its tasks to learn, 
We to a freer pathway turn. 

The trot is broken, now we feel 

The boisterous spirit which gives release 

From form and fashion and lumbering wheel, 
And, over the turf, restraint may cease. 

So, cantering here in the softer ground. 

We sing with the rhythm of every bound. 

Our hearts exulting are falcons free 

As those they tell of in old romance 
And whither they fly our will would be, 

26 



O little care we for a plunge or prance 
When barriers meet us, for life is wild 
In all the bliss of its speed beguiled. 

Then, flushed with pleasure, we give the rein. 

Our horses leap with sudden joy, 
Flashing feet and flying mane. 

Every sinew seeks employ 
And the flowing winds divide 
Rude caresses as we ride. 

Lo, they blind our merry eyes, 

Blow away the mirthful tears. 
Break our hurried words and rise 

Into music at our ears, 
Surely love is in the blast. 
May we dare to run so fast? 

Dare? Our spirits are possessed 

And we go bounding over hedge, 
Panting, though we despise tO' rest. 

And clattering down a rock-ribbed ledge 
Until again the road we meet 
And stay our horses' unwilling feet. 

Their nostrils, as the fading sun, 

Are red, from the day's race and drink 

The cooler air. Night has begun 

Her stealthy march and soon, we think, 

The hour has come to seek once more 

The homeward street and stable door. 

Yet, how we, in returning, yield 

To the soft influence of the gray 
Sweet twilight ! Every quiet field 

Sleeps 'neath a veil of mist until the day 
Shall each wild bloom renew. The shadowy air 
Seems spirit-haunted everywhere. 

27 



Reveries steal upon us. Truth 

In the full confidence of thought is free. 
And, in the happy faith of youth, 

All portals open. Cherished fancies see 
Their doubles in a new beguiling grace 
At each heart's gateway and embrace. 

What if we two, who end our ride 

In the pale light of the now rising moon. 

So pale as yet that the blush may hide 

And the glance tell nothing, what if we soon 

May know from accents guided by the heart 

That long will be life's highway ere we part! 

1872. 



THE RAIN THAT FALLS AT NIGHT 

When, on the mountain or in desert places, 
Meek blossoms, in their wild and tender graces, 

Wilt from the ardent sun's voluptuous sight. 
They lift again their petals at the breaking 
Of fresher day, to gladder life awaking. 

Delivered by the rain that falls at night. 

When, on his humble couch, the toiler weary 
Tosses amid his sleep from visions dreary 

Of all his well sown fields in arid blight. 
He in the darkness hears, with spirit glowing, 
The patter on path and roof and then the flowing 

And splashing of the rain that falls at night. 

When, on the desolate field of battle lying, 
Some hero in the gloom is slowly dying. 

Deserted by his comrades in the fight. 
With thirsting lips and frame in fever burning. 
How grateful is his youthful face, upturning 

To feel the cooling rain that falls at night. 

28 



Whence are these drops that come with gentle 

blessing 
To soothe each anguish of our days oppressing 
And give the darkest hours a strange delight? 
They are the tears of angels, fair immortals, 
Who, pitying, gaze below from heaven's portals 
And pledge their care in rain that falls at 
night. 



1903. 



ON A SHEET OF PAPER 



A poet, mid a day dream, got a spirit-chilling 

letter, 
For he had fallen debtor to a Croesus of the 

town, 
He sighed, in honor's high intent, for such a 

greed unfeeling 
And fancy ceased revealing as he cast the letter 

down. 

But when a rapture woke his soul upon a fairer 
morning. 

He caught, its poison scorning, at the letter lying 
near. 

And on the back entangled all his drifting in- 
spirations 

Until his mind's creations bore him from the fens 
of fear. 

Thus, on a sheet of paper, throbbing for a while 

together, 
Held in abhorrent tether, there were words of 

rage and bliss. 
Of wealth's ignoble craving and the full heart's 

overflowing. 
As little concord knowing as the world beyond 

and this. 

29 



The poem, given to the world, blessed many- 
souls dejected, 

Its grosser gain collected paroled all the debt- 
or's need, 

Who found the sweet embrace of fame w^hen 
Croesus lay a-dying, 

His sordid riches flying, e'en as flies the thistle 
seed. 

1880 (entirely imaginary). 



LITTLE VISITORS 

How was I honored today by a call. 
How was my heart happy over it all ! 
Was it, you think, any fashionable dame, 
Mighty official or Croesus who came 
With a smooth tongue or an arrogant mien ? 
No, you would only two children have seen. 

Bob was the brother, but eight, if you please, 
And barely six was bright little Louise, 
Lovely as any child charmer of Spain ; 
These, told of no one, to see me again, 
Came gaily half a mile over the snow 
Seeking a friend of eight long months ago. 

Months, that in their brief existence were years. 

Held not maturity's doubtings or fears. 

Held not indifference, canker or rust. 

Still was I kept in aff^ectionate trust; 

Bless their sweet memories. Surely they knew 

That my tried heart was both loving and true. 

Washington, February 17th, 1895. 



30 



HAPPY MOMENTS 
(Written at i6 years of age.) 

How blessed do the moments seem 

When, watching nature's wondrous face, 
The soul seems in a hallowed place 

And doth with happy visions teem. 

Strange fancies make it flee its throne 
And mount, swift winged, the azure skies, 
Nor dare to watch with dizzy eyes 

The spot from which it just hath flown. 

No bound restrains its wayward flight, 
It knows not now the world or care. 
But revels in the upper air 

With wider scope than dreams of night. 

When it regains its earthly sight 
It cannot tell its dreamy bliss, 
Too big for words, it knows but this, 

It bathed in dazzling waves of light. 

Philadelphia, i860. 



31 



POEMS OF THE SEA 



A SONG BY THE SEA 

The waves of the sea flow rudely 
When threatening breezes make, 

They hurry in from the ofiing 
And topple and curl and break. 

They roar at the craggy rampart 
And creep to the marsh's side, 

But the sailor's child is fearless 
At the drift of the highest tide. 

The waves of the heart are restless, 
They in from its ocean move 

To surge through the bay of friendship 
And glide on the shore of love ; 

They break 'mid the crags of passion 
And foam with a mad increase, 

But none may await their coming 
Or know when the tide shall cease. 

Ah, chill are the waves of ocean 
And dreary its dirges sound, 

Yet death comes ever so gently 
To those in its bosom found 

And rather may one float lifeless 
At the feet of the sailor's child, 

Than fall where those deeper billows 
Of passion are coursing wild. 

Atlantic City, 1867. 



32 



ON THE ATLANTIC 

Great ocean, stretching forth on every side, 

My all enchanted eyes 
Survey thy azure distance far and wide, 

As thought its memories. 

Of all the round of nature, dost thou most 

The vital soul inspire. 
Bearing it outward from the changeless coast 

To realms of free desire. 

I love to sit alone and watch thy might, 

Dreaming of nameless things 
Here and beyond in that blue infinite 

We seek on hastening wings. 

The breadth and vastness of the vision calms, 

E'en while thy turbulent breast 
Mine own portrays, for thou hast healing balms, 

Thv very life hath rest. 

1885. 



FAITHFUL SHIPS OF THE DAY 

Of ships that pass in the night 

Our sweetest of poets sings. 
Faces that vanish from sight 

While yet their greeting brings 
The hope of a love untold. 

The trust of a friendship's stay. 
Wrapped in the darkness cold, 

Quenched by the blinding spray. 

And the poet's mournful song 
Tolls yet in each doubting heart 

That drifts through the night so long 
Where beacons are far apart, 

33 



But those who their course maintain, 
Sincere until morning grey, 

Shall see on the sunny main 
Fair ships that pass in the day. 

Ships they shall overtake 

With greeting of flags and cheer, 
Ships shall come from their wake 

To sail on the blue waves near, 
With signals of helpfulness 

To voyage the same long w^ay. 
Brief ships of the night, no less 

Are there faithful ships of the day. 

Washington, 1894. 

A SHIP ON THE STARBOARD BOW 

"There's a ship on the starboard bow," 

One cries from the deck to me, 
As I sit on the swaying prow 

And gaze at the azure sea, 
"A ship, and whither its course?" 

I ask as I watch it now, 
Impelled by the free wind's force. 

That ship on the starboard bow. 

"There's a hope for thy lonely heart," 

Cries an inner beguiling voice, 
"Revealed on its way apart 

To say it may yet rejoice." 
"And whither," I plead, "is its way. 

This hope in the life before? 
How long shall its bliss delay, 

And where is its happy shore? 

Doth it follow in fair convoy 

The course I have measured best, 

To draw me with straining joy 
Still on to its blissful rest, 

34 



Or, borne on the fateful wind, 

Doth it cross the path I go. 
Rebuking the toil behind 

And turning my hope to woe?" 

Full little the sailor knew 

Of my heart's responsive cry, 
As over the waters blue 

He gazed with a searching eye. 
But he answered, "The sails afar 

Are set for the wind we take, 
And every brace and spar 

For the self-same course we make." 

O ship on the tossing wave, 

O hope in heart weariness. 
The token doth make me brave, 

The answer hath balm to bless. 
There surely hath come to me, 

With the breezes that cool my brow, 
A peace o'er the azure sea 

From the ship on the starboard bow. 

Written on La Bretagne, May 2d, 1891. 



LONELY OCEAN 

Once, when sailing on the ocean, 
Long I watched from day to day 

For some vessel on the circuit 
Of the blue line far away. 

But the great shield of the water 

Bore upon its steely rim 
Not the faintest spot arresting 

Eyes through distant gazing dim. 

Where, methought, are ships which cluster 
Thidcly at each people shore, 

35 



Coming ever and departing, 

Trafficking the round world o'er? 

Doth an ocean sprite disperse them, 
Do the haughty billows wall 

Each from each, or cloudy curtains. 
Pearly tinted, 'twixt them fall? 

Then I mused of love and friendship 
When our days of joy depart. 

Whence and why so quickly vanish 
Those once moored heart to heart? 

And I doubted whether ocean 
Or misfortune most possessed 

Lonely wastes of weary tossing. 
Toil without relief or rest. 

Crested hopes of brief endurance. 
Depths unsounded, black as night, 

Lowering clouds all aid concealing ; 
This my fancy merged with sight. 

But the love a few had given 

Bid my better hope prevail 
And, with eyes again uplifted, 

Lo! I saw a sunlit sail. 

1878. 



36 



A SHEAF OF SONNETS 



THE POET'S HEART 

The poet's heart hath an unbolted door 
That opens to the south and grants a way 
To every hand and vesture. Never day 
But writes its golden "Salve" on the llooir 
Through branches of clematis which explore 
The over-arching frame. The swallows gay 
In airy loops through that bright entrance play 
And restless doves await their food before. 
Oft doth the willing portal gently swing 
Untouched of any one, as if the breeze 
Of Summer had love offerings to bring 
From fragrant clover fields and hillside trees. 
Then come those guests of sweet imagining 
To do whatever joyful thing they please. 

1887 



THE POET'S MISSION 

The poet shunneth an ignoble mind 

Sterile of tender feeling. He is sent 

To sing the carols of the innocent, 

To voice creation's beauty unconfined, 

The bending flowers of his path to bind. 

Interpreting the Grace Omnipotent. 

He soundeth hearts for every sweet intent 

And giveth winged spirit to mankind, 

For beauty is but nature's creed of right, 

All fancy is dear thought divinely free. 

All song a rapture of the soul's delight 

When, fondly, peace and love and hope agree, 

And God doth give the poet clearer sight 

Of loveliness that is and is to be. 

1903 

37 



GREAT MINDS 



High natures build their towers far apart, 
Whether to dwell in majesty or pain^ 
Troubled or doubted by the throngs that strain 
In common greed about the city's mart ; 
So Dante lived in solitude of heart, 
So Milton struggled for the spirit's gain 
On battlements of thought the few attain, 
Steel clad and mighty from the battle's start. 
Such natures wear the helmet fancy lends 
Its hero who at will would walk unseen. 
For when they grovel, all the world attends 
In fellowship but, when they pass between 
To gain strange heights, no alien comprehends. 
They mount unknown while new enchantments 
screen. 

II 

The visions seen in solitude's repose 

By higher minds that rear their branches wide, 

Shadowing lesser spirit growth beside, 

They cannot to the bush and weed disclose 

Or share with any envious vine that grows 

Upon their strength to mar their leafy pride ; 

The lesser nature may the broad deride. 

But the great trunk a loftier regence shows. 

Thus, nigh the vast Pacific's nurturing wind, 

Gigantic trees hold centuries in scorn — 

Nature's great living beacons that remind 

The world, in aimless wandering forlorn, 

Of immortality of fame behind 

And shall ennoble millions yet unborn. 

1903 



38 



NATURE'S NOBLEMEN 

I love a true aristocrat who bears 
Upon his brow high wisdom's coronet, 
With brightest gems of widest culture set, 
Who, as a cloak oi princely ermine, wears 
A grace serene and sure that gladly shares 
His largess with the needy as a debt 
Of highest faith and honor, to beget 
Pure noble living in a world of cares. 
Such aristocracy owes naught to birth 
Or rank or riches, it is self-ordained ; 
These breed the basest bastards of the earth 
To pride, desire, might and pomp untrained, 
But nature's noblemen atone for dearth 
Of greatness in the host by lusts enchained. 

1903 

RICHARD COBDEN AND JOHN BRIGHT 

Personally met in December, 1863 

High elm and oak of England's honored dead, 
Happy was I in youth to humbly stand 
Before such proven men, to take their hand 
Of greeting when my suffering country bled 
From fratricidal strife, to know they led 
The laboring thousands of our mother land 
Amid their want to better understand 
The cause of freedom. Great of heart and head, 
These champions of honor gazed above 
The smoke of greed and passion and the shame 
Of strong cabals, and now, since long the dove 
Of peace abides, we know that in their name 
And her pure throne, doth England hold the love 
Of her proud offspring best and share our fame, 



39 



QUEEN MARGUERITE 
To whom the Author was presented in 1882 

Oh regal Pearl of Savoy, years ago, 

When Italy was made by fortune sweet 

The pleasure garden of my wandering feet, 

In thy enchanting realm I came to know 

Treasures of genius, scenes that ever grow 

In memory's joy ; yet only was complete 

My gratitude when privileged to meet 

The grace thy matchless attributes bestow. 

Then, more than others, by attention blessed, 

I answered questions of my art and land. 

And later, at thy palace as a guest, 

Saw thee enthroned while, ranged on either hand, 

All beauties of thy court did but attest 

Thy charm supreme to every heart command. 



ON A BOOK OF POEMS BY ALEXANDER 
SMITH 

Acknowledged to a friend who had loaned them. 

To-day thou art mine angel. Thou hast given 

In this, my Patmos, to my soul to eat 

A little book of words as honey sweet, 

And, as I taste, the lust of earth is shriven, 

Cloud barriers for my upward flight are riven. 

Yet not the New Jerusalem do I greet, 

But pale Valhalla and the fitful heat 

Where Thor, the mighty thunderer, hath striven, 

And, as he laughs defiant, I behold 

Beside his anvil and his luminous bars 

A mortal shade in anulation bold 

Seizing his hammer and from glowing scars 

Smiting, before the crimson steel is cold, 

A scintillation of resplendent stars. 

1886 

40 



THE EVE OF A CENTURY 

How strong is he who, when he wills, can turn 
And hold in life's scant book some treasured leaf 
Of purpose, since the winds of joy or grief 
So speed the pages man can rarely learn 
The parables whose lessons he may earn 
From rich robed meditation. All too brief_, 
After youth's jocund seed time, is the sheaf 
Of harvest, far too much the chaff we burn ; 
Yet, seeking in life's pages what is best. 
And daring upright emprise for sweet good, 
We, 'mid the tangled plot, shall gain a rest 
Of soul within, a valiant hardihood. 
And find between the leaves youth's flowers 

pressed. 
And havCj at length, all mysteries understood. 

Washington, Dec. 31, 1900 



FANCY, FACT, FAITH 

Wouldst thou sweet Fancy in the mind enthrone, 
Her dexterous brush shall fascinate thy sight, 
Her graceful arabesques impart delight 
And for all deeper arguments atone ; 
Wouldst thou the sculptor Fact believe alone, 
His patient chisel and persistent might 
Shall seem from error's cave to hew the right, 
Giving thee truth from the refractory stone ; 
But sibyl Faith, by inward vision fired. 
From sight and touch would higher joys derive, 
Beneath the fervor of her scheme desired 
It seemeth vain for nature's work to strive. 
The picture is with air and light inspired. 
The blue-veined stone is pulsed and made alive, 

1890 



41 



THE FIRE OF AMBITION 

Ambition's course is as a hearthstone fire 

Kindled in lighter fancies, quickly fanned 

By Hope ingenuous to well withstand 

The damp of worldly doubt, then leaping higher, 

Warming in its enchantment of desire, 

Full of bright visions to essay command 

Of cloven oak with many a flaming hand, 

Eager to strive and joyful to aspire; 

But, when life's night draws ominously near 

And glowing visions flicker. Meekness keeps 

Watch of the struggling fire and, in fear 

Of danger to her dwelling place, she heaps 

Ashes upon the embers' lingering cheer 

And parts the logs still burning ere she sleeps. 

1900 

THE CRITIC 

He who hath entrance to a garden close 

Of studious effort, whether small or great. 

Should in all noble purpose animate 

With tillage due each blossoming plant that grows 

From seed celestial and, in climbing, shows 

True bloom and leafage ; he should arbitrate 

For good and beauty and with care abate 

All rank excess that hides or harms the rose; 

Bnt one who. narrow minded, brutal, vain, 

Maketh a garden and a barnyard share 

His equal spite and jest for vulgar gain. 

Who trampleth down alike the flower rare 

And poisoning vine, but giveth genius pain 

And maketh all his vagabondage bare. 

1903 



42 



THE SPENDTHRIFT 

He who doth spend or hazard in excess 
Of each year's gift or rashly conjure friend 
To, for his venture or indulgence^ lend, 
Squanders more wealth than gold, since^ in the 

press 
And rack of debt, wisdom and cheerfulness 
Leave his fair house to gloom, while nigh attend 
Vultures that lurk to ravage in the end, — 
Doubt, mockery, grief, pain and lean distress; 
Then, in the rooms where love and comfort grew 
And prudence fed and honor greeted all. 
But emptiness and ruin meet the view. 
Age's chill winds blow through each desolate hall 
And groaning casement, ever to renew 
Their requiem for joys without recall. 



THE CRAVEN WORLD 

A hero of the stage who faces wrong. 

Oppression, jealous greed and pompous pride, 

Which, in their foul hypocrisy, o'er ride 

His knightly sentiment and honor strong, 

Hears the loud plaudits of the breathless throng, 

Tearful, indignant, as the acts confide 

His lofty purpose_, needfully denied 

To base or blinded foes through struggle long; 

But when, in life's defiles, a soul is brave 

For justice and for virtue, oft in pain 

It strives alone. Mistrust and guile deprave 

The craven world, that balances its gain 

While evil triumphs, few impelled to save 

Until the hero hath his dragons slain. 



43 



COMPASS VARIATIONS 

When the brave mariner, with anchor free 
And sloop fresh ladened speeding from the land, 
Holds the long tiller in a firmer hand 
To wrestle with the buffeting of the sea, 
He sometimes notes the compass tremblingly 
Yield to a secret treacherous command 
Of ore in the cargo near, nor may withstand 
His skill their mystical dread affinity. 
Thus latent passions^ by a chance revealed 
In life's mid ocean, agitate the sotil. 
And, with the guiding stars by clouds concealed, 
Confound the higher spirit's true control. 
Few are the passing ships, for aid appealed, 
Wide is the stormy course from youth's deter- 
mined goal. 

1888 



LOST FRIENDSHIP 

Sometimes it happeneth in the lives of men 

That, by eluding peril, they have read 

Their names amid the records of the dead 

And laughed because the misinstructed pen 

Was mocked by happy destiny. But when 

We lose a friendship, as a broken thread 

In trouble's cave, or love that might have spread 

Its palms_, as yesterday, before us, then 

Our heart doth read in that intolerant heart 

Of its own death, believing, though we live 

And, to the sight of others, have a part 

In hopes a little longer fugitive. 

But laughter dies and tears in silence start 

Lest life may never equal solace give. 

1895 



44 



HEART CHERISHED ONES 

Love well, my heart, when beauty thou dost see 
With handmaidens that serve her but to bless, — 
Truth, honor, purity and cheerfulness, 
Mercy and patience^ bounty ever free, 
Courage and faith and magnaminity, — 
Love more, as these abound for her caress, 
Rejoice, thy love to measure and profess. 
Scorning base tongues as knighthood strengthens 

thee; 
Dearer than friendship, purer than desire, 
Such love, in giving homage widely due. 
Makes life in every emprise sweeter, higher, 
And gains thee kindred more than nature's true ; 
So shalt thou, knowing earth's best gift, aspire 
And youth's fond dreams with tendered grace 

renew. 



PROVEN FRIENDS 

Above the throng bedecked who gayly share 

My feast and gather near when fortune smiles. 

Are those who closer stand if she beguiles 

In base duplicity, whose spirits dare. 

From truth of heart and earnest trust and care, 

To journey with me through life's steep defiles, 

Bound to my rope when scaling perilous miles 

Of icy heights in heaven's purer air. 

These are my soul's companions, cherished, dear 

Beyond all rank or gold. They bear along 

My sword and shield, my food and cup of cheer. 

Their loyalty of heart doth make me strong 

In sorrow or ambition. With them near 

Peace charms my slumber, joy invokes my song. 



45 



TO A MAPLE TREE 

That once stood in LaFayette Square, Washing- 
ton, and was only notable in Autumn. 

By the north entrance of a verdant square 
Where trees of many climes form rich array, , 
There stands a maple, now a great bouquet, 
Bright as the fervent yellow of a pear 
From Bernardino ranches, radiant, fair 
And rounded out in every leafy spray. 
Decked, as some wedding maiden of Cathay, 
With gold embroidered raiment wondrous rare ; 
So doth the richer growth of spirit stand, 
Sometimes unseen, unknown, throughout the 

brawl 
Of storm, the wilting of heat, amid a band 
Of sordid aliens, patient until the Fall, 
When, lo, it shines by Infinite command 
And in perfected grace surpasseth all. 

October, 1893. 

THE ORCHID 

Thou flower of fairy fancy, from the air 
Comes thy existence, from the morning dews 
The pearly white that evening mist renews, 
Translucent in virginity so fair, 
And, when the sun doth to thy bower repair, 
A rhapsody of kindred rainbow hues 
Thy light fantastic passion all imbues. 
Capricious, beauteous, archly debonnaire. 
Teach me a life as far absolved from pain. 
As magically gay as thou hast found. 
O dream ethereal, bid me live again 
On dew and air and light, not of the ground ; 
Lead mind and heart to efflorescent reign 
Of such a glory as doth thee surround. 

1899. 

46 . ., ., 



THE LILY ' 

An angel once to earth indulgent came 

When, in a forest of its tropic zone, 

A plant unblessed with flowers made its moan 

"Oh, spirit pure, the land is all aflame 

With rival blooms that put my heart to shame. 

Grant me a crowning grace that I alone 

May hold in praise before the Maker's throne — 

Yon snow girt peak — and be absolved from 

blame." 
The pitying angel to the summit flew. 
From its pure drift she wrought a flower fair 
And brought it to the plant whereon it grew, 
Fragile but kept from melting by her prayer. 
So kindly years its tender charms renew 
To whisper ever of angelic care. 

1899 



47 



POEMS OF PLACE 

MEMORIES OF ITALY 
Written after a tour in the Winter of 1 881-2. 



O fellow-pilgrims by indulgent fate ! 

The days have come when we our paths must 

bend 

From this fair kingdom where, in truth, so late 

We came unknown, and part as friend from 

friend. 

Ere mutual pleasures yet have reached an end, 

And ere we kiss, alas ! a different hand 
Of beautiful Italia, and attend. 

Too soon, departure from her spell-bound 
land, 
Ye for the west and I from bright Venetians 
strand. 

II. 

As birds in spring-time taking northern flight 
Pause for a while in some fair spot to rest, 
So here in courtly Florence we alight, 

After too brief a day of chat and jest, 
Of genial fellowship the parting test, 

From Rome's beguiling streets and azure 
skies, 
Spared from the perils which her gates invest 
To view Art's palaces which proudly rise. 
Wedded, though Arno's flood between their glory 
lies. 

III. 

Brief is the sunny Winter that has sped 
Above us in our wanderings, yet how long 

The devious course unwearied feet have led 
Amid the valleys of the land of song, 

Amid each city's happy-natured throng, 

48 



The ruins of a world's immortal past, 
The tombs of pleasure and the pomps of wrong 
Which still to-day pathetically last 
To teach forgetful men grim Destiny's forecast. 

IV. 

Yet, happily, men sadden not their days 

With constant musing of the vague to be. 
Saving the devots of exacting ways 

Of duty and of penance, who would see 
Sweet nature never from their bondage free ; 

But open hearts and healthy lives dispel 
The gloom of doubt with youth's beguiling glee, 

And music drowns the dull cathedral bell, 
And dancing feet glide on in palace and in dell. 

V. 
With smiles for leisure, we were often fain, 
In thoughtful mood, to seek the pious hill 
Where broods the ancient church in troubled 
reign, 
The dictates of her once resistless will 
Now challenged at her portals. Proudly still 
Guards she the treasures of a sumputous 
youth, 
Seeking in stubborn doctrine tO' fulfil 
Her close autocracy with little ruth 
For heaven's soul taught freely given truth. 

VI. 
How rare her riches and how widely gleaned 

When she controlled the intellect of earth, 
When rank and talent for her blessing leaned. 
And Knowledge, sheltered from the outer 
dearth 
In cloisters, gave so rare an offspring birth. 
Art, then, persuaded by her lavish gold. 
Mid sensual living glorified the worth 
Of all that saintly multitude of old. 
And her indulgence kind repaid an hundred fold. 

49 



VII. 

For one appeared a cardinal in right 

Of Art's high faith. St. Peter's stately dome 
And vaulted aisles hear witness of the might 

Of Buonarotti's genius, finding home 
In unknown regions and beguiled to come 
To earth and re-create his visions strange 
In that high chapel, Titan-thronged, where 
roam 
Men from the ends of earth and strive to 
change 
Vainly their humble mind to that great spirit's 
range. 

VIII. 

We chanced, upon another day, to walk 

At leisure o'er the excavated field 
Of Rome's forensic fame, and there to talk 

Of all magnificence of art revealed 
Amid the dismal ruins half concealed. 

Some lonely columns, two triumphant gates 
Which proudly stand, as vowing not to yield 

While the dismantled Colosseum waits 
Beyond in its austere submission to the fates. 

IX. 

O humbled Forum of a mighty age ! 

If e'er, attesting God, the very stones 
Had need to cry instead of men, thy page 

Of ruined art in truth would raise its moans 
For all man's misused sway, to which the 
groans 
Of martyrs would be requiem. Like a grave 
New opened, with its few and scattered bones 
And funeral tributes, doth thy presence crave 
The tears of those who love but can no longer 
save. 

50 



X. 

A lowly desert mid a city's poor, 

The stranger only seeks thee to explore 
For treasures unseen of the vagrant boor, 
Found by the loadstone of beloved lore 
And traced with hallowed zeal upon the floor 

Of that old battle-ground of wise and strong 
Whose lonely shafts Art studies to adore 

And History points to, Time's drear way 
along, 
Orations all in stone or voiced with warrior's 
song. 

XL 

Insatiate pride upon thy tortured plain 

Has, at a word, made marble fanes aspire 
In rival glory, rich in conquest's gain, 

To, in a day, be crushed by vengeful ire, 
Or in rebellion wrecked, or swept by fire 

Of ruthless lords of men in giant strife. 
Scorning a world to gratify desire. 

Baring the breast of virtue to the knife 
And making broken hearts their hour-glass of 
life. 

XII. 

These are no more, and now a race in shame 

Rises like one recovered from a spell 
Of evil spirits to restore its fame 

And seeks to gather up the gems which fell 
From its mad hands, to guard them high and 
well 
And clothe itself in garments made anew. 
That, when the world its history doth tell, 
It may with happy eyes the present view 
And deem past honors pledged to dignity more 
true. 

51 



XIII. 

Yet is its mood not always thus sedate : 

The Carnival arrives with painted mask, 
To scoff at grave ambition and, elate, 

Indulgence take which it would vainly ask 
Of melancholy prelate, — irksome task 

Is thrust aside for unrestrained delight, 
Youth drinks but mirth from out the slender 
flask, 
For daily frolic, and throughout the night 
Th' unwearied dancers whirl in many a costume 
bright. 

XIV. 

The Corso, given up to pleasure's whim, 

Yields Trade a captive bound in trappings 
gay; 
Rome's fairest faces overflow the rim 
Of balconies unnumbered, and array 
A mimic war with men, a storm of clay 

In whitened pellets pouring, or by flowers 
Exchanging kinder token. Then the way 
Is coursed by frightened steeds, or evening 
hours 
See tapers oft blown out ere maidens seek their 
bowers. 

XV. 

Or gaudy chariots, ranged in bright parade, 

Delight, succeeded by the wiles of fire 
In many a rainbow hue subdued and made 
The sport of men, as Samson, who in ire 
Might, free in strength, have swept with fury 
dire 
The laughing throng before him. Thus the 
pride 
And force of soul that raise our natures higher 
Must sometimes turn for witless mirth aside. 
And of the respite gain an end at first denied. 

52 



XVI. 

Now from the spell of Rome's eternal walls 

Turn thou, my muse, in sad farewell away 
To where the sun with warmer influence falls 

And Naples basks beside her opal bay. 
Loquacious in her oft-time holiday — 

Forgetful in the present of a past 
That dreams about her, wheresoever may 

The wondering vision turn, — a treasure vast 
Of history and song in loveliest setting cast. 

XVII. 

Her teeming streets betoken little heed 

Of outward peace. A merry people strive 
By fair or foul to quell their simple need 

Mid mud and flowers. Scarce can fate de- 
prive 
(Their food the highway fringing-), and, alive 

To mirth and music, leaving to the sage 
Or stranger all the treasures of that hive 
Of despoiled cities of full many an age. 
They joy in song and dance on famed St. Carlo's 
stage. 

XVIII. 

Yet what a dread o'erhangs the landscape fair, 

And the wide city stretched beside the sea, 
While that dark mountain cone in upper air 
Pours its pale cloud ! As some, by sad de- 
cree, 
Fear death may come e'en mid the banquet's 
glee 
In demon-haunted spasm, as some may fear 
A birth of shame, a poisoned cup, a tree 

Of torture, so^ from trembling year to year, 
Men smile with aching heart lest awful doom be 
near. 

53 



XIX. 

Stern mountain ! It was on a cloudless night 

When first we saw thee, and each tender star 
About thy crest paled in the broader light 
Of the full moon ; yet saw we from afar 
Upon the azure sky a sulphurous bar — 

Thy sullen heart evolving its own cloud, 
As hidden wrong doth part confession mar — 
And, 'neath its folds, the glow of fires 
avowed 
Within thy burning breast, awhile in penance 
bowed. 

XX. 

Ere many days, audacious we awoke 

To scale thy black and life-accursing side, 
Combating storms before our courage broke 

And naught of blissful vision was denied ; 
From Capri's purple rest to Naple's pride, 

The vassal hills beyond, sweet vales between, 
The shining sea where tiny vessels glide, 
Each timid village mid its pastures green, — 
All, as by angel's aid, in that Ijright hour were 
seen. 

XXI. 

But underneath our feet a monster lay 

Whose life was desolation. Though asleep, 
His angry murmurs gave the soul dismay, 

While, from his ashen jaws, adown the steep 
A hemorrhage of fire pouring deep 

Curdled in smoking folds upon his side. 
A countless host of monsters, heap on heap, 
Seemed mid some awful struggle petrified 
In the gnarled crust of that o'erwhelming lava 
tide. 

XXII. 

As the grim octopus, that being dread 

Of unknown ocean, near some sombre cave 

54 



G^ne-like reposes, with his Hfted head 

Eying the waters and a living grave 
Hid in his gliding arms, whence naught may- 
save 
The hapless victim, so Vesuve doth wait 
Clutching anon the beautiful, the brave. 
In its wide fiery streams insatiate ; 
Fair fields and cities hid by swift remoreless fate. 

XXIII. 

Pompeii, the distressing task is thine. 

And thine, sweet Herculaneum, to tell 
The ages of disasters which enshrine 

Your names forever — terrors that befell 
Your lives in few brief days, and made a hell 

And then oblivion of your home delights, — 
A grave of all wherein you loved to dwell, 

Exchanging emulous hours for gleeful nights 
'Till death the curtain drew and quenched the 
theatre lights. 

XXIV. 

The mountain's wrath upon your glory came 

In that dire time; nor ever malice sped 
Amid the gaps of error as the flame 

Of lava to your banquet and your bed; 
Nor ever hath fierce tyranny o'erspread 

The slave's scant joy as did the sombre pall 
Of ashes drift on your distracted head. 

With smothering horror merging wall to 
wall 
And whelming meekest age and weakest child- 
hood all. 

XXV. 

Sealed up alike from Time's corroding touch 
And man's unhallowing need by Will Divine, 

Your shroud is lifted now, nor men too much 
May marvel at revealings which combine 

55 



To marshal jealous centuries in line 

And prove the human heart as still the same, 
The brain as active then, the skill as fine. 
For life's essential joy, since Science came 
That men might not lose hope from Art's declin- 
ing fame. 

XXVI. 

Men marvel, for all things of household use. 

All implements of toil or tradesman's need, 
Of sport or skill or crafty war's abuse, 

The artist's work, the lawyer's blackened 
deed, 
The baker's loaves, the farmer's varied seed, 

All labor's products, countless in array, 
Mock, to our gaze. Time's centuries of speed 

Raised, Phoenix-like, from ashes to the day, 
Where roofless walls yet vie in decoration gay. 

XXVII. 

But shop and temple, mill and rich abode, 
Proud tomb and wheel worn street, are all 
forgot 
When we behold the sculptor's dext'rous mode 

Of casting nature's counterfeit, the lot 
Of many a life revealing when the hot 

And furious fall of ashes torture gave 
To face and form crouched in some hapless 
spot 
To find, unheard, uncomforted, a grave, 
By gods renounced and man all powerless to save. 

XXVIII. 

O little maiden prostrate on thy face. 
Or thou, in tender hope of motherhood. 

Thy ring-pledged hand in vain imploring grace. 
Or thou, old man, in calm submissive mood 

Lain down to final sleep, — what thought of 
good 

56 



In heaven was yours mid that last bitterness 
O'f broken love and life ? The heart's hot blood 
Throbs as we view ye with a strange distress, 
For pity knows not time when claiming woes' re- 
dress. 

XXIX. 

Faint echo this, Pompeii, of thy woe 

And, of thy joy, words vainly may pursue 
The flight of fancy as enthralled we go 

About thy streets and all thy life renew. 
All doors are open now : where once the few 

Sought favor, we can enter without fear. 
And where dwelt evil, walk, remaining true. 
And where the poor, find not a pleader near, 
And where the player trod, no ringing plaudits 
hear. 

XXX. 

Yet, prostrate Herculaneum ! in thee, 

Scarce half unburdened of the lava tide 
Which scorched thy very heart, our feet were 
free 
To pace a stage which tunnelled masses hide 
From the once smiling sky. Nor was denied 

A tumult, but it was the smothered roar 
Of heavenly thunderings mocking human pride, 
Sounding the depths appallingly, till more 
Our cavern seemed some dread Plutonian cor- 
ridor. 

XXXI. 

Gladly we sought, when that weird storm had 
passed. 
The treasure-plundered ruins 'neath a town 
That jealously o'erlooks them. Fate has cast 
Sadly their lot and, at her adverse frown. 
E'en the blue sea which, where yon steps run 
down, 
The slender feet of many a maiden kissed 

57 



In brighter days, has fled. The past renown 
Of marble courts some roses only list 
To keep in fragrance sweet ere they too shall be 
missed. 

XXXII. 
But do we these lost cities need to mourn, 
Or clamor judgment? Theirs was but the 
way 
Of all that blue sea's border. They were born 

Where nature urges pleasure ere delay 
Withers desire and but brief dismay 

Led them, complete, to an immortal reign 
Of resurrected grace. Without decay 
Of lingering years, they live to us again 
And stand like beacon towers on history's distant 
plain. 

XXXIII. 
They did not die like Curtius, seeking doom. 
Bravely supreme of soul, for other's sake, 
(Fame's loved ideal) nor in all the gloom 

Of long sustained adversity partake. 
In fortitude unbowed, the thoughts that make 

Men heroes — oft unknown except above. 
Nay ! but in chance and sudden call to break 
Life's treasure box so ruthlessly, they move 
Light-hearted, ill-starred hosts, to sympathetic 
love. 

XXXIV. 
With less dramatic tale, where Psestum stood. 
In prosperous days, the southern coast along, 
Three temples check the traveller as they brood 

In calm and stoic dignity. The song 
Of Grecian priests is ended, for the strong 

Hath triumphed over beauty, save in these 
Gray monumental stones which even wrong 
Seem to forgive in their deserted ease, 
Warmed by the genial sun and lulled by murmur- 
ing seas. 

58 



XXXV. 

From their repose we turned, and northward 
rode 
The devious way of that enchanting shore 
Where nymphs and mermaids well might have 
abode 
And poets find their muses evermore; 
Amid the glens and cliffs where streamlets pour 

Their tribute to the sea in white cascade, 
Where vineyards cling above the breakers' roar 
And fisher hamlets scarce their foam evade, 
Grateful in summer days for yon steep mountain's 
shade. 

XXXVI. 
There stretches calm Salerno and, beyond, 

Amalfi nestles, loveliest of the band 
Of white-robed sisters who, serene and fond. 
Watch that bright coast with tender hand in 
hand ; 
Where once these ruined towers made their 
stand 
With anxious vigil 'gainst piratic greed. 
Lured by the bounty which no stern command 
Of the brown sower prompted from the seed. 
And wealth of fortune's sons from civic tumult 
freed. 

XXXVII. 
Again we move, and leave Salerno's bay 
And each fair haven loathfully behind, 
Castellamare seeking and away 

To charmed Sorrento, where abruptly wind 
Great ridges to the sea and hold confined 
In loved embrace that refuge pledged to 
peace 
From dread Vesuvius, distantly defined 
Across the wave, and Naples' gay surcease. 
That spot where Tasso's muse ecstatic found re- 
lease. 

59 



XXXVIII. 

O lovely scene! it is a joy to live 

Before thy influence. The pulse again 
Beats to victorious march and memories give 
Enthrallment to each spot that owns the 
reign 
Of happy Naples, waiting in her train, 

Each with some tribute of her glorious past, 
Each in its own bright beauty robed to gain 
The pilgrim's homage, here by fortune cast, 
Who counts all perils light while such beguile- 
ments last. 

XXXIX. 

The hills are set with gardens, — as with gems 

A rich tiara, — where, serene, await 
The vacant halls of kings. Free pleasure stems 

The wayward tide to, by the ocean gate, 
Rest on those purple isles that float in state, 

Swan-like before the zephyr or the gale^ — 
Fair Ischia and Capri, willed by fate 

To yield the way to many a conqueror's sail, 
For Naples so beguiled, defence had light avail. 



XL. 

Phoenicians here, and Greeks, in ancient days 

Drove their adventurous galleys to the shore ; 
Resistless Rome possessed these lovely bays 

And held patrician pomp ; the Spaniard bore 
With haughty rule, forgetful of the Moor, 

Upon the careless people ; but, withal. 
Peace wrought her crowns surpassing those of 
war. 

Blessed by the muses whose seductive call 
Drew an immortal line to Fame's emblazoned hall. 

60 



XLI. 

What voice would venture to declaim the scroll 
That her charmed touch illumes, to fitly sing 
Laudations from the ostentatious roll 
Of stately warrior, emperor or king, 
In gilded armor passing? Who can bring 

The shade of Cicero to earth again, 
Or learned Pliny, or unfold the wing 
Of Virgil's mastery and Dante's pain ? 
Appalled, my muse but dwells on one fair wo- 
man's reign. 

XLII. 

I humbly sing, with love and lesser dread, 

Vittoria Colonna's meed of praise. 
Her guileless youth, in highest culture led. 

Abused not those proud dignities that raise 
The dizzy mind from truth, or knew the maze 

Conceit devises beauty to ensnare. 
Love gave her noble heart no rude delays, 
But from her childhood her Pescaro' rare 
Entered its priceless faith and learned a world to 
dare. 

XLin. 

He rose a hero in his nation's wars 

To early die, and all desire fled 
From her deep heart forever, while his scars 

In it had faithful counterpart and bled 
Through nights of childless grief. Then calm- 
ly spread 
A cohort from the soul, aggressive armed 
For noble deeds. Her ardent genius sped 
To its high purpose and a world was charmed 
By the impassioned verse that her pure love em- 
balmed. 

XLIV. 

And not alone the riches of her song 
But her wide influence took a fuller grace, 

6i 



All men were awed by genius that no wrong 

Was kindred to, that sought with loyal face 
Exalted natures only for a place 

In her loved audience, that meekly bent 
To cheer the crippled children in life's race 
And dared to use all power by heaven sent 
To strip bedecked deceit from prosperous sin's 
intent. 

XLV. 

By the keen eye of virtue she discerned 

With noble welcome each regard sincere 
That pierced the mists of life and bravely 
spurned 
Those covert natures, disappointed, drear, 
Which foster intrigue, but at friendship sneer. 

Unfitted for its benediction sweet. 
Lacking the grace by which her voice could 
cheer 
Alike the poor and outcast of the street 
Or weary souls whom men with ostentation greet, 

XLVI. 

Of such was Michael Angelo, whose age 

Repelled, disdainful, malice-poisoned blame, 
Nor heeded witless praise — an august sage 

In Art's wide realm, whose dignity of fame 
Set narrow hearts aside. Colonna came 

With nature fitted his great soul to know. 
Revering aspiration more than name 

Or mighty handiwork, — as comes the glow 
Of sunset on vast cliffs which then their glory 
show. 

XLVII. 

In her, ideal grace of heart and mind 
Adorned ideal presence and dispelled, 

By guileless mirth and fancy unconfined 
And noble thought, the doubt his spirit held 

62 



If worldly lusts and sophistries had quelled 

All loveliness of nature evermore. 
She gently smiled, and that true friendship 
swelled 
Life's stream beyond the chilling years it 
bore, 
And flowers of peace renewed their perfume on 
its shore. 

XLVIII. 

Before such regents let my muse repose ; 

Upon the scene fond Memory surveys 
They fitly bring all glories to a close, 

They fitly end the throng that Fame arrays — 
One the high chief of art, whose genius plays 

With its fine snares and obstacles, and one 
Italia's truest loveliness portrays. 

As if in her fair womanhood alone 
Nature would challenge all ideal Art had done. 



PASADENA 

O fair Pasadena, as sweet as thy name 
Are memories of thee when distant I sing 

And give as a laurel my verse to thy fame, 
A chaplet whose leafage unwithered shall cling. 

The charm of thy beauty still glides to my heart 
In peaceful serenity, bright as a dream. 

And, though fate detains me reluctant apart. 
Again, in a vision, before thee I seem. 

Again I behold thee in rapturous rest, 

'Mid orchards of orange and olive at ease, 

Watched over by many a snow-covered crest 
And lulled by the breath of the monarch of 
seas. 

63 



For jealously mountains and ocean divide 
Thy gentle protection their power between, 

As if they had nurtured no less than a bride 
Predestined to sit on the throne of a queen. 

The ocean bestoweth his mists as a veil, 

The mountain doth fashion a robe of her snows 

But over thy freedom they neither prevail 
Or lure from the joy of thy virgin repose. 

Content in thy maidenly beauty to lie 
In nature's luxuriant drapery bright, 

Thou hearest the wooing of valley and sky 
And amorous zephyrs in waiting delight. 

The smiles of the bright orbs of heaven are thine, 
In joy that their gifts may such beauty per- 
suade, 

Since all fairest flowers that earth can combine 
In color adorn or in fragrance pervade 

The couch of thy musing ; the pride of the rose, 
The heliatrope, fuschia and meek mignonette 

And lavish carnation their graces disclose 
And in a perennial passion beget 

Their sweet adulation. The violet sighs, 
The tulip, geranium and daisy contend 

To win but a glance of thy gladdening eyes. 
And hosts of white lilies from evils defend. 

Verbena and dahlia and heartsease await 
In all the fair legion no words can portray. 

While peach and magnolia and orange dilate 
Their blooms in a glory and pomp of array, 

And palm and palmetto in statelier line. 

The cycle plant armed for its lingering sleep. 

The cactus and pepper and laurel and vine 
And the dark eucalyptus their vigilance keep. 

64 



Kind Winter »vills not from his peaks to descend 
But ever contributes cool streams from his 
snows. 
From Summer's mad passion doth Neptune de- 
fend. 
Spring smiles at thy morn, Autumn charms thy 
repose. 

The bird and the butterfly^ every fair thing 
That lives on the sweets of thy fruit and thy 
bloom. 
That floats in the sunlight on rapturous wing 
And weds thy gay flowers of yearning per- 
fume — 

All haunt thy enchantment, youth's hope and de- 
sire, 

Beloved Pasadena, find joyous surcease, 
No longer for fame doth man groan or aspire 

Or age long for heaven, enwrapt by thy peace. 

1897. 
(Written after a trip to Southern California.) 

THE PRAIRIE 

Lo, to the sight inimitably vast. 

The undulous prairie stretches to a line 

That seems to bound the future and the past, 
A mystic circle of a plan divine. 

Its anarchy of verdure far and wide 

Is bright with blossoms, like a foaming sea. 

Save that the petals spread in humble pride 
Of seed to bloom in ages yet to be. 

And, like the adventurous sail on distant wives 
Flecking the blue horizon, we descry, 

Perchance, a hovel where some outcast braves 
The wilderness when human greeds defy. 

65 



No tree the pilgrim to its shade invites 

O'er all the plain, no gladdening water flows, 

But changeless all abides through solemn nights 
And changeless liveth when the morning glows. 

Save for the varying seasons, from the green 
And multi-colored raiment of the Spring 

To Summer hues in ranker verdure seen 

And russet charms that Autumn chidings 
bring. 

To restless bees the blossoms give their sweets, 
The grasses sigh 'neath the tumultuous wind, 

Alternate rain or snow inclement beats, 

The cyclone's whirling lash leaves wreck be- 
hind: 

The vagrant's careless camp fire spreads its flame 
From service brief to lay a region waste, 

While, only, from its doom the timorous game, 
Despised of human skill, make desperate haste ; 

Since now the unwieldy buffalo no more 

Blackens the landscape wild — a wandering 
host, 

Nor roaming redmen craftily explore 

Haunts of the foe to win a chieftain's boast. 

Though man may claim, with avaricious mind, 
The wide domain no husbandmen possess. 

It lies as if abandoned, unconfined. 
Created and resigned, — a wilderness. 

Earth in her bare humility sublime 
Bows to the wide dominion of the sky, 

Watching its astral armies as they climb 

With steadfast march the blue plateau on high ; 

66 



Watching the burning of their countless lamps 
The torches their reviewing leaders bear. 

The drifting smoke of their assembled camps, 
Their signals gliding through the realms of 
air; 

Watching their virgin queen in each campaign 
She dares, while ever fleeing from the wiles 

Of day's enamored sultan, in whose reign 
And love the unclad earth awakes and smiles. 

Thus inspirations of the day and night 
Throng to the mind amid the solitude 

And, from the mighty space that greets the sight, 
Its thought is with a kindred range imbued. 

It learns to look beyond obstructions near 
That narrow its horizon and to see 

Life's aspirations with a vision clear, 
And joys to every striving spirit free, 

And from the heavy burdens others bear, 
The secret woes of hearts in sore distress, 

The groaning of the strong in guilt's despair, 
The sobbing of the weak without redress. 

It learns that, if the earth on which we tread 
Seems profitless and weary, hard and wild, 

There are exalting powers above us spread 
To make our lives and yearnings reconciled. 

Oklahoma, 1895. 



CATSKILL MOUNTAIN 

Upon the Hudson's silvery expanse 
The traveller speeds between its sentinel hills 
To banks whence the pavilions of their chief 
In proud encampment are beheld afar. 

67 



Mooring-, he threads the verdant intervale 
And, slowly climbing to the highest cliff, 
Stands mute in rapture. Backward o'er his 

course 
An undulous plain spreads boundless to the east 
And, winding o'er its midst, the river seeks 
In dwarfed humility some sheltering sea. 
Majestic States the beauteous scene divide 
Where once the redmen knew as little bound 
Or limit as yon eagle doth in air, 
Amid pervading forests which, with them. 
Have vanished from the bare and pleading earth 
Before the axe and plough of wiser might. 

Lo, in the charm of the declining sun 
A tenderer color warms the varied green 
Where tiny homes like daisies grow apace 
While, on the distant river, every sail 
Seems but a floating blossom. Far beneath 
The lanes of quiet vales appear no more 
Than the fresh track of some exploring worm 
And the plowed fields but spaces on a lawn 
Deprived of sods by some Cyclopean race. 
E'en now the sun is girded to depart 
And deeper shades succeed of purer blue. 
Then the wide shadow of the mountain heights 
Glides eastward over the illumined land 
Like an extending flood that merges all 
It covers in oblivion. Anon, 
It mounts from misty earth and scales the towers 
And dazzling battlements of soaring clouds 
That taunt the mountains dull stability. 
While yet the traveller gazes, he beholds 
Himself transfigured on their glowing front, 
A giant shape beyond all gift of fame, 
Then, as the brief dispelling of a dream, 
Doth his grey presence on the crimson mist 
Slowly dissolve in sombre evening shades. 
Now a cool hoyden wind doth herald wide 

68 



The coming night. Stars signal from their vast 

And solemn realm in growing multitude 

And mystery sublime, while far below 

The window lights of scattered dwellings gleam 

Amid the gloom as lamps of fisher boats 

Anchored anear the shore to wait the day, 

For, ocean like, the level landscape spreads 

In azure depth and early falling dew. 

Nor shall the traveller yet seek repose, 

For over dim forgotten parapets 

Of cloudland doth a silver radiance steal. 

Hail ! gracious moon, parting thy eastern gates 

And pressing every misty curtain back, 

Put off thine opal robes and in thy full 

Denuded beauty mount the softening sky. 

Scarce less a welcome doth the Greenlander 

Give to the arrowy radiance of the north, 

That mystic aureole of the polar Thor, 

Amid the long enduring sway of night, 

Then every young heart of the country side 

Accords th}^ monthly regency. No more. 

Shrouded in darkness, doth each household turn 

From waning embers to consoling sleep 

But gaineth genial hours now between 

The arbitrary sun's commands of toil. 

Dark motes appear upon the moonlit lanes 

In ant-like haste and distant sounds are heard 

Of roadway songs and joyous laughter clear. 

Some home is bright in hospitality, 

The dance proceeds, the ample feast is spread 

And men and maids unite in honest mirth 

Until their steeds are weary and the dogs 

Have howled the tidings onward miles away. 

With midnight, all the revellers have gone 

And but the owl with his soft bassoon 

Soundeth his watch at dismal intervals 

Until the shrill fife of the cock at dawn 

Stirreth his drowsy harem's darkened rest. 

When the glad traveller ends his longer sleep 
69 



What wonder doth await th' astonished sight, 
What scene confound, in earth or heaven dis- 
posed ? 
Doth he confront reaHty or dream? 
The sun stands regal at the dazzhng east 
All canopied in purple and in gold, 
While, widely spread below and far beyond, 
A snowy plain appears, such white expanse 
As screened the mystic birth throes of the world. 
The clouds have bowed themselves in reverence. 
Prostrate and silent as an angel host 
With pearly pinions folded. Not a trace 
Of earth appeareth, but ethereal realms 
Have sent their legions down and spread a path 
Of golden palms for day's effulgent king. 
Oh, icy plains of northland, steadfast drifts 
Of Andes or Alaska, ye are chill 
And heavy winding sheets forever bound 
Which man may shun or tremble to behold, 
But here the snowy apparition floats, 
A veil of nature's sleeping loveliness. 
For, when creation in an hour of prayer 
Hath worshipped its Divinity, the winds. 
Descending from the mountain, break the spell 
That holds the floor of heaven, touch the wings 
Of the bowed clouds until they softly rise 
Swaying together and extending up 
Their spotless pinions, while the sun rides on 
In shining raiment and, munificent, 
Scattereth gold about him. As his course 
Mounteth the azure heights, the waiting mists 
Spread their light wings and joyfully ascend 
To their accustomed regions, while the earth 
Smiles 'twixt their shadows and extols the day. 
Its dewy blossoms open, its sweet birds 
Sing matinals, the brief confiding prayers 
Of childhood lips from many humble homes 
Rise swifter, higher than the fleecy clouds^ 
Bearing the sweeter oiTering of souls 

70 



To the Eternal Spirit Who hath wrought 
All light as emblem of the Truth Supreme 
All beauty as a pledge of Love Divine. 

1871 



ON AN ADIRONDACK LAKE 

Tonight, fair lakelet, from thy shore 
I free my lightly poised canoe 

And then, with gently sweeping oar, 
Speed outward on thy waters blue. 

The sleeping cedars that enfold 

Thy rippling sheen are dark and dim 

But in their shadows I behold 
The lilies floating at thy rim. 

Above, the moon's unclouded light 
Scatters the starry host apart 

And charms, serene, the deepening night. 
While argent mists like spirits start 

From distant bays and tangled glades, 
Untrodden but by thirsting deer. 

And melt until a glow pervades 
The opal tinted atmosphere. 

Then, as I pause for deamful rest. 
Out of the mist there comes to me 

A fairy presence, self confessed 
The queen of all the realm I see. 

Like a great night moth winged, she flits 
Coyly about my light canoe. 

Then at its point so gently sits 

That not a ripple spreads to view. 

71 



Silent I gaze beneath her spell 
Until, like flute notes echoed near, 

The fairy's accents softly tell 

The secrets of her mission here — 

The mission of her myriad band, 

Invisible to mortal sight, 
Alert to serve her least command 

In gladsome rounds of day and night, 

In all of nature's high intent. 
To silent serve with magic skill, 

While loveliness with peace is blent 
And harmonies its cycles fill. 

And bounty from its fullness grows. 

Thus love and joy pervade his soul 
Who haunts its solitudes and knows 

The mysteries of its sweet control. 

Long musing of this world unseen, 

My reveries find oblivion, 
Then, at my light canoe's careen, 

I start, — The fairy shape has gone. 

I wait, but only mists abide 
And, taking up my slender oar, 

Above the limpid depths I glide 
To gain the balsam-scented shore 

And leave thee with reluctant heart, 
Fair lakelet, to thy midnight swoon. 

Guarded by every fairy's art, 

In full enchantment of the moon. 

1894. 



72 



DUDDINGTON 

[This was the name of a mansion of the Car- 
roll family which, with the block of ground on 
which it stood and which was the remnant of a 
large estate, remained high above street grade a 
few blocks south of the Capitol until 1885-6, when 
both dwelling and plateau were razed for "mod- 
ern improvement."] Written in 1885. 

Wandering far upon an afternoon 
Of bright beguiling Spring time, I beheld 
And entered stately Duddington which soon 
Shall pass away among the things of eld. 
E'en as yon giant tree so lately felled 
Within the grove that centuries have grown, 
So shall its life be stricken, so dispelled 
Vain memories as its wilted leaves are blown 
By mutinous winds which oft the ancient house 
bemoan. 

Its walled domain a wooded island stands 
With cliff and cape above each vandal street 
Bounding its acres, — once extended lands 
Where swept the vision o'er a princely seat, — 
Full many a gentle hill and meadow sweet 
Spreading below to bright Potomac's stream, — 
A landscape formed for rapturous eyes to greet. 
Now levelled for the human pens that teem 
Across the checkered waste to mock the painter's 
dream. 

Nor have its fair possessions been resigned 

To nameless thousands only. One proud hill 

Was granted when accordant States combined 

To honor their paternal chieftain's will 

And build their power on it to fulfil 

The destiny of liberated man. 

And, from the garden, now o'ergrown and still, 

We view in stately marble that proud plan 

The nation in young faith on Carroll's soil began. 

73 



Then, ere the Capitol had won away 
The glory of the motherly estate, 
Or dreamt that all her beauty should decay, 
Fair Duddington gave welcome to the great 
Whose virtue had been mighty to create 
A self-controlling people. In her halls 
The brave and eloquent oft lingered late. 
And through the minuet of stately balls 
The fairest women stepped that fondest age re- 
calls. 



Here the "Three Graces" drew their lovers' feet 
And turned the gaze of each attendant guest, 
Here the high envoy of the papal seat 
Took genial relaxation and confessed 
But happy subjects. Statesmen welcomed rest 
And diplomats from many thrones of earth 
Who came at hoyden liberty to jest, 
Found in the social throng at Carroll's hearth 
Such noble hearts and minds as best can yield to 
mirth. 

Prompted by household tales, the eye can see, 
Crossing the lawn and curving gravelled way 
In rattling coaches, many a company 
Of gentry in the picturesque array 
Of bygone fashion with its tresses gray ; 
They throng the hallway, each high room invade. 
Stroll in the garden, join in shuttle play. 
Drink of the dairy's wealth or, by the aid 
Of liveried zeal, partake the sumptuous feast ar- 
rayed. 

O joyous past ! O rhapsodies of youth ! 

Sometimes so far, and yet so little gone. 

Each house hath haunting dreams but this, in 

truth, 
A retinue its past can claim alone, 

74 



So richly robed that nothing can atone 
For time's indignity. Nor wedding more 
Nor birth nor feast shall closing record own, 
Nor even death may enter as before. 
Alas, that none is strong to save and to restore. 

Where now are all its votaries of mirth? 

The elder have no longer pride or care, 

Their faded raiment only left to earth, 

The younger need no powder for their hair. 

The very walls that sheltered brave and fair. 

These are to fall untimely. E'en the mound. 

Their lofty pedestal, before the share 

Must disappear, as if the very ground 

Of Duddington refused a burden less renowned. 

Thus, like a vision, shall the old estate 
Flee sight or touch, and, mourning for its fall, 
I leave a slender chaplet on its gate, 
A brief memorial, ere the dreary pall 
Of modern greed shall overwhelm it all. 
Slaying a stately sentinel of the past 
In every falling barrier and wall. 
As youth's desires, which have clung so fast. 
Are, one by one, in age from brooding hearts out- 
cast. 



75 



MOUNTAIN LIFE 

[At the author's summer abode, Indian Rock, on 
Stonyman Mountain, Va.] 

I dwell upon a mountain brow 

That seems to scorn all human care, 

Begirt with rugged oaks that bow 
Before the torrents of the air. 

Mine eyes delight in clouds that wreathe 
The kingly summit they revere, 

My nostrils in a rapture breathe 
Its death defying atmosphere — 

Its wind that, with ambrosial kiss, 
Throughout my wearied being steals 

And some uncomprehended bliss 
To every grateful sense reveals. 

Toil seems a pleasure to the frame 
Redeemed from heated vales below, 

The blood leaps like reviving flame 
From a regenerate heart aglow. 

The mind seems all at peace with fate. 

Forgetful of its every wrong. 
In new ambition raised elate 

And, in a truer courage, strong. 

From brooding doubt it wakes again 
To hold abiding life more dear 

And banishes distrust and pain 

From high and pure existence here — 

Existence where all love and truth, 
Unharassed by the world's deceit, 

From nature gain rechristened youth 
And freely make their offering sweet. 

76 



Oh happy heart, well mayst thou find 
That no restraint thy fullness mars 

When thou art so above mankind, 
So near the influence of the stars. 
1894. 



INDIAN ROCK (A NOCTURNE) 

The tenderest moonlight on Indian Rock 
Is shining" where chestnut and oak interlace 

And flecking the pathway with shadows that 
mock 
The fingers of all but a wood nymph to trace. 

i 
It vies with the lichens to mottle the ledge 

And dapples the sumptuous mosses so green 
With fairy rings, in the ferns on the edge 

It dances while gliding their arches between. 

Each tree trunk with silvery tablets it decks 
For fancy her sweetest of dreams to record, 

The deep spreading shadows it daintily flecks 
And fondles the wild blooms that sleep on the 
sward ; 

It falls on the hammock that listlessly sways 
In the night wind and then I, astonished, be- 
hold 

A fairy enchanting who smiles as I gaze, 

Her form lightly pressing each pendulous fold. 

Reclining in graceful abandon of rest, 

The beautiful presence revealed to my sight 

Lies silent, in reverie's rapture confessed, 
Her nature attuned to the symphonic night. 

True queen of the rock, to its magic complete, 
She mingles her witchcraft with that of the 
moon 

n 



And ever her mirth or her sentiment greet 
And hold me entranced or arouse me as soon, 

For sentiment dwells in her magical eyes 

And mirthfulness mockingly plays at her lips, 

She gazes, and love no sweet triumph denies, 
She laughs, and despair from expectancy slips ; 

And still, as she sways in the light or the shade, 
I watch the fair face with a longing untold 

Until a kind cloudlet its shadow hath made 
And the amorous night wind hath whispered 
"Be bold." 

Then I kneel at the side of the vision so fair 
But, lo, as I seek to embrace her, she springs 

And glides to the rock, like a spirit of air, 
Where, smiling compassionate, softly she 
sings — 

"Ah, mortal so ardent, thy passion begun 

Is all to the fairy nature unknown. 
It bumeth our wings as the heat of the sun, 

No gift of such love for its harm could atone. 

The love that we feel hath no sorrow or fright. 
The heart is refreshed as by grace of the dew. 

It liveth serene as the moon's fullest light, 
Forever confiding, eternally true ; 

It sendeth no fever or jealous unrest. 
It knoweth no sighing or lingering tears, 

It giveth alone what is purest and best 
And thus our lives have no limit of years, 

For passion that blooms like a peach tree in 
Spring 

Is sated in fruit and in Autumn is bare. 
While love in our hearts blossoms ever, to bring 

But beauty and joyfulness, free as the air. 

78 



So live thou and we shall bestow to thee long 
Our charm for thy bowers, our art for thy 
gain, 
I leave thee, but list to my followers' song — 
She vanished, and then came their gentle re- 
frain. 

From the world's toil and strife, 

Doubting and dread, 
Up to the mountain's life 

Lo, we have sped. 

Here in the moon's delight. 

Here 'neath the stars. 
No sorrow bringeth blight, 

No trouble mars. 

Here in celestial air, 

Life's truth we find 
And, from all doubt and care. 

Pure hearts unbind. 

True life is only love. 

Full trust its peace, 
No joy endures above 

Such high release. 

As nature's beauty blends 

With bounty sweet. 
So mortal grace transcends, 

Led by her feet. 

Nothing in selfishness 

Kept to decay. 
All of its means to bless 

Love gives away — 

Gives and no treasure asks. 
Joyful to gain 

79 



Good, in its willing tasks 
Ever to reign. 

Thus, amid moss and fern, 

True to our queen, 
Gladly her will we learn. 

As thou hast seen, 

And by her grace we sing 

Ere we depart, 
Let every good we bring 

Gladden thy heart. 

With silence, I long in the hammock reclined, 
From whence the bright presence affrighted 
had flown, 
And, kissed by the moonlight and sorrowing 
wind, 
I mused, of the love of the fairies, alone. 

Stonyman Mountain, 1895 



A WELCOME TO INDIAN ROCK 

[Read at a Lawn Party given, on the author's 
estate, to sojourners at Stonyman Camp, August 
23rd, 1898.] 

All welcome to the guests who flock 

To-day like birds to Indian Rock 

And grant their beauty, wit and grace 

So briefly to this garden place ; 

All welcome to the few who lend 

Their varied talent, to the end 

That music and dramatic art 

May give each sense a joy apart. 

Here shall smooth pathways lead your feet 

'Mid beds of mountain flowers sweet 

80 



To sloping lawn whereon the dance 
May young and old alike entrance, 
To shaded ledge from whence the eye 
Shall many a distant range descry 
And view, bathed in the sunset's glow, 
The fertile valley far below. 
Here may each guest find full content 
In gay pavilion, garnished tent, 
And, by the Rock, a feast select 
From tables all with ferns bedecked 
Or in the spacious Lodge arrayed 
By kindly mountain nymphs who aid 
Your host in every earnest plan 
To please alike the inner man 
And inner woman and employ 
Even the craving inner boy. 

How changed the scene that we survey 
In present social concourse gay 
From scarce a hundred years ago ; 
Then trees, that yet above us grow, 
Doubtless beheld the red men here 
Securely camped, without a fear 
Of any paleface, though their gaze 
Saw his keen axe their forests raze 
Along the spreading vale to yield 
Him harvests from each furrowed field. 
His musket ever primed at hand 
To guard his hut and conquered land. 

Here the red warriors long defied 

On pathless heights the Saxon pride 

Of new possessions, venturing down 

These wild steep canyons, with a frown 

Of hate upon their brows, to smite 

Their foes, by wily craft, at night. 

The firebrand and deadly bow 

Their vengeance spreading far below 

Ere, with untiring silent feet, 

They gained once more this sure retreat 

8i 



Amid the clouds, to grimly rest 

Like scornful eagles in their nest. 

Here did they, with a lighter care, 

Pursue the deer or bait the bear 

Or shape, when life was dull and sere 

The flint heads of the dart and spear, 

Which now we sometimes gladly find. 

Here did the squaws in patience grind 

The maize they gained with little toil 

In open glades from stony soil, 

Or fashion gorgeous battle gear 

For braves whom they might well revere,- 

While each pappoose of blinking eye 

Scorned, in its chieftain blood, to cry. 

Now all the past is warp for dreams, 
Yet still your poet's fancy deems 
Some parody of olden times 
May linger in his fieeting rhymes. 
Some old braves still, in care's release, 
Gather to smoke their pipe of peace 
And, while the fragrant weed inspires. 
Tell of exploits, about their fires. 
While younger limbs pursue the dear 
And thread the forests far and near 
And strive in sports or find delight 
In stealthy prowess after night. 
Here, for each growing chieftain's sake. 
Fair squaws still gaudy trappings make 
And tan their skins and grind their corn 
Twixt ivory molars. Here they scorn 
The trails of civilized conceit 
And scale the heights with active feet. 
Here many maidens hunt their gane 
Whom braves should only win b)- fame 
And prowess worthy of their grace 
And charms of nature as of face, 
Who, if these braves are near or far, 
Let nothing their enjoyment mar, 

82 



Find mirth in every circumstance, 
Lead gayly in each tribal dance 
And leave in every lodge and tent 
Some bounty with their merriment. 
These all, who now about me stand, 
I welcome with a cordial hand 
And seem in thought to greet as well 
The guests that in our memories dwell 
Of other weeks and seasons bright, 
That all may share the true delight 
Which, in this mountain atmosphere. 
Draws natures, to themselves sincere, 
Into a kinder, fuller trust 
Of friendship honest, helpful, just. 



THE LODGE OF HEATONAWA 

[Lines complimentary to Misses Jeannette and 

Laura P , authors, after their visit to 

Skyland in August, I902.]. 

Where the Blue Ridge parts the valley 
Of the winding Shenandoah 
From the lands of the Potomac, 
On a high brow of the mountain. 
Standing as a mighty wigwam. 
Standing as a chief of red men. 
Rests the lodge of Heatonawa. 
Far above it shouts the summit. 
Rising in a rugged glory, 
"Who within thee seeks a shelter. 
Dares to live in this my cloudland. 
Ventures to abide so near me?" 
Far below the peaceful valley. 
Spreading to the Massanuttan, 
Gently whispers "O thou dwelHng 
High above my fields and rivers, 



83 



Tell thy brave my bosom giveth 
Sweeter nurture, safer hiding." 
But, beneath his roof contented, 
Heatonawa, though he heard them, 
Heard the valley and the summit 
In their pleading and defiance. 
Sat as if his ears were covered, 
Sat in joy of his possessions. 
In the shade of oak and chestnut. 
Of the birch and of the maple. 
In the rustle of the pine trees. 
Sat he, by his door, beholding 
All the beauty of the flowers. 
There were columbines and daisies, 
Golden rod and tiger lilies, 
Laurel blooms and every blossom 
Of the mountain in its season ; 
There were flowers of the valley, 
Lovely in their briefer triumph. 
Charming in their richer colors, 
While among them all in eager 
Searching for their hidden sweetness. 
Flapped the butterfly emblazoned, 
Buzzed the bee in zealous hurry. 
Darted humming birds as quickly 
As a poet's thought that flashes, 
Charms — and, lo, is lost forever. 
In the lodge of Heatonawa 
There were many skins and hangings, 
Fair embroideries of maidens. 
Many stores and many vessels, 
Many warmly covered couches. 
For he often to it welcomed 
Such as might partake his pleasures, 
Whether of his tribe or others, 
Chieftains and their squaws together. 
Ruddy youth or gentle maidens, — 
All gave joy to him in sharing 
Simple comforts of his dwelling 

84 



And the peace pipe by its fire. 

So it happened, when the corn stalk 

Bent its sheathed ears and tassels, 

Meek as ever truest worth is, 

When the moon in golden fulness 

Was a long enduring beacon 

In the hunting grounds of heaven, 

In the prairies of the cloud drift. 

Came two maidens of the westland 

To beguile the lonely chieftain, — 

Jeannetaka of a spirit 

Merry in the plumes of fancy, 

Laurababa, gentle natured. 

With a soul of lofty visions ; 

Came they both with reeds in blossom. 

Wands of magic they had gathered 

From a field of incantation. 

Found in weariness of toiling. 

On the mountain brow they rested. 

Gazed upon the misty valleys. 

As an ocean stretched below them 

With the hills as crested billows. 

Asked the rocky cliff its legends, 

Drank from icy springs it gathered, 

Heard the birds' responsive voices. 

Watched the buzzards, skyward soaring. 

Watched the chipmunk in the branches, 

Dreamed before the crimson glory 

Of the sunset, and awakened 

To the moonlight's long enchantment 

And the starry host so near them. 

Then, in many silent trances. 

All the healing of the cloudland 

Gave them strength of hand and spirit, 

Gave them newer inspiration. 

So they in the lodge divided 

Mystic tongues and patient labors, 

Cunning arts and high endeavor. 

Where they sat the flames grew brighter, 

85 



At their touch the brazen bearings 
Of the fuel shone resplendent, 
At their speech the evening shadows 
Softened in the glow of feeling, 
Faded in the light of laughter, 
And their presence held the sunshine 
Steadfast as the days succeeded. 
When, at length, with Summer's ending, 
Jeannetaka, Laurababa, 
Rose, like rested birds of passage, 
For a flight to other regions, 
Still prevailed their incantation. 
As they vanished from the Skyland, 
From the lodge of Heatonawa, 
'Mid its waving ferns and flowers. 
Not a cloud was in the azure, 
Not a mist the valley troubled. 
And the mountain said "Behold me 
Vestured in my richest raiment, 
In the morning sun exulting, 
That ye may, O gentle maidens, 
Often in your thoughts remember 
Clifif and field and grove and bower. 
With a longing heart remember 
All the cooling winds of heaven. 
All my peace when ye are weary. 
And, upon another season, 
When I smile upon the valleys, 
Seek the lodee of Heatonawa." 



UPON AN OLD VIRGINIA ESTATE. 

Though Autumn bids me seek my task again, 
My thought in fond beguilement lingers still 
Where, better known than any lofty hill, 
Were brave and fair whose memories shall reign 
When now neglected tombs no more remain 



86 



Or stately mansions stand to mourn the ill 

Of alien dwellers who presume to fill 

The chambers of immortal ones in vain. 

But there abides domain where, though the clay 

And stone are failed, still may pilgrims find 

The spirit of the past without decay, 

The lineage true, and, after greeting kind. 

Know that the best endureth there to-day 

In graceful beauty led by cultured mind. 



THE WHITE CITY 

[Written a year after the World's Fair in Chi- 
cago.] 

As changing seasons dull procession make, 

I turn to blissful memories aside 

And muse, as near a loved one who hath died. 

Of yon entrancing city by the lake 

It grew a lasting sorrow to forsake. 

Long have I gazed upon her in her pride 

Of snowy raiment, held her deified. 

Upon her throne majestic, to partake 

The homage of the ages. Now, behold, 

The sparrows live that chirped upon the shore 

At her creation and her charms untold 

Of beauty, grace and strength abide no more. 

A living dream of wonders manifold. 

What miracle her glory can restore? 

1894 



GRANADA 

Farewell, Granada, bosom of the earth 

In all the bounty that the sunlight dowers. 

In every charm that Nature's grace embowers. 

Thy nurturing breast is worthy love's true birth, 

87 



Thy groves and gardens fitted for his mirth, 
For his enamored years the fragrant flowers 
And orange blooms, the nightingale through 

hours 
Of moonlight vigil singing passion's worth ; 
But in a higher zeal, the ranging eye, 
Passing from plain to mountain, rests its gaze 
Upon thy lone Alhambra and, anigh, 
On walls that tell of Christ's or Caesar's praise. 
Then may the Moslem hear a Christian sigh 
And e'en a contrite prayer to Allah raise, 

Granada, 1881. 



THE YELLOWSTONE PARK. 

On the new world's proud crest a wide domain 

Of might mysterious supreme abides 

In Nature's vast creation, here she hides 

The vessels of her alchemy to gain 

From chemic secrets and the stress and strain 

Of throes volcanic and contending tides 

Of cycles all her wonders ; here she rides 

Amid the clouds majestic in disdain 

Of man's control, here cleaves the groaning 

earth 
In awful gorges, stains its whitened crust 
With many dyes, gives boiling cisterns birth 
And fierce eruption in Plutonian lust 
Of harm ; A^et here a lake in splendor lies, 
A peaceful font of blessing from the skies. 

1903 



88 



POEMS ON LOVE 



THE MELODY OF LOVE 

At times, when an orchestral leader stands 
With beating rod, — a Moses at the rock 
Of Meribah — and smites with sudden shock 
Fountains of sound from the impetuous hands 
That move miraculous to his commands. 
There glides beneath loud themes that interlock 
Some gentle melody conceived to mock 
At tumult like a brook in flowery lands ; 
And so of love^ amid life's care and pain 
Or pomp or strife, whose instruments combine 
Clamorous around, there flows a bUssful strain 
Of music through the heart, so sweet, so fine. 
That, when its charm is found, no griefs remain 
And life seems less terrestrial than divine. 

1890 



MUSIC OF THE WIND 

A minstrel on an autumn night 

Two musing lovers saw 
And from its case with gilt bedight 

Did his guitar withdraw. 

To many amorous strains it thrilled 
Beneath the player's hand, 

Yet, though it all his art fulfilled. 
No plaudits could command. 

Anon he ceased and then the wind 

Swept over his guitar 
And seemed a blissful song to find. 

Far floating from a star. 

89 



The lovers turned with eager ear 

To catch the theme divine 
And, as it drew their spirits near, 

So did their arms entwine. 

"Thus," said the maiden, "to the heart 
No skill love's music brings. 

But, all unbidden, it will start 
When heaven sways the strings." 



LOVE GROWTH 

Comparing life to aeons, love proceeds 

As the stalactite and stalagmite grow 

From drops of heavenly birth that silent flow 

And, trembling, leap the void of earthly needs. 

The woman's heart above expands and feeds 

Of its excess man's quickening heart below ; 

In sure direct approach they firmly know 

A faith that neither time nor doubt nor darkness 

heeds. 
At length they meet in rapturous delight, 
They blend together as a beauteous whole. 
Seamless and true, in love's renewing might, 
Grace guiding strength yet stayed by strength's 

control, 
In one fixed column noble to the sight^ 
Perpetual in affinity of soul. 

1899 



LOVE 

"What call ye love ?" saith one of spirit proud. 
Give heed, I answer. Once my fate was cast 
Upon a stormy ocean. Near the mast 
I watched it tracing labyrinths in the cloud 
When lo! while sheltered mortals sobbed aloud, 

90 



Two plaintive land birds, fluttering on the blast 

In uttermost despair, came helpless past 

Yet whirled i' the lee and gained the moaning 

shroud. 
There, happy tokens to the toiling crew, 
They clung a moment safely. Then away 
From final hope the arrogant tempest blew 
One outcast. Had the other strength to stay ? 
O might of love ! she would not, for she flew, 
Following her mate through requiems of spray. 

1886 



THE DAWN OF LOVE 

A loveless life resembles ghostly hours 
Of later night when all is dark and chill, 

A time of silent birds and folded flowers 
When sullen earth exhales its vapors ill. 

And one who wanders from a sleepless bed 
Stumbles in doubt upon his unseen way. 

He shrinks from nature's touch as from the dead 
And finds in each black rivulet dismay. 

Within his breast the present and the past 
Their trouble with the outer gloom combine, 

His destiny seems in misfortune cast 

And hope and courage every dream resign. 

But lo, along the clouded eastern sky, 
The shrouding gloom decreases and there 
grows 

A pallor to the anxious watcher's eye 
That presently a silver clearness shows. 

As spreads the trust of friendship in the mind 
And banishes its sorrows, so expands 

91 



The argent radiance upward unconfined, 

Dispelling darkness from the swooning lands. 

The birds of hope essay their early song, 
The damp of night appears in pearly dew 

Of penitential beauty and along 

The rivulet its clear depths charm the view. 

Then tints of purple and of gold pervade 
The eastern light and, floating into air, 

The sun of love triumphantly has made 
A conquest of the weary watcher's care. 

All wide possessions, doubtful in the night. 
Are now in verdant grace about him spread, 

Joy's waiting flowers open to the light, 
The doves of peace soar grateful overhead 

And all his heart expands, in bliss unknown 
Amid the darkness, to extol the day 

That bringeth safety, life and joy alone 
And harvests which shall every care repay. 



THE CASTLE OF LOVE. 

A castle that true love endowers 
Can nevermore crumble away. 

Though lighter stones fall from its towers. 
Those fixed by devotion shall stay. 

Foundations of truth and of pureness 
And bastions of honor and trust 

And high walls of sentiment's sureness 
Can never be strewn in the dust. 

Nor can hearts, if worthy of gaining 
The rapture these towers enfold, 

Believe that, true vigil maintaining. 
They yet may but ruins behold. 

92 



Sweet fancies, the battlements carving, 
May flee in a storm from their task, 

Desire may plead she is starving 

While waiting the bliss she would ask. 

But, ever within at their duty. 
True hearts are erecting secure 

A stronghold of firmness and beauty 
That, while they exist, must endure. 

Where, whether besieged or at leisure. 
They still in their wealth can delight 

And know bliss without the world's pleasure 
And faith beyond enmity's might. 

Fond hope, with her whispers so tender, 
Shall make them forgetful of rest 

Until, without dream of surrender. 
They finish their walls to the crest. 

Aye, finish each turret and tower 
And raise every banner on high 

To prove true love's patience and power 
In deep and unending supply. 



LOVE REIGNS. 

Ah, Love is still reigning, his sway is unbroken 
And Youth, his fair herald, proclaims him the 

king, 
By every sweet grace and by every kind token 
Of eye and of heart, by each gallant word spoken, 
By every clear peal that the wedding bells ring. 
He asks his dominions, while, early responding 
From every broad zone that old earth doth com- 
bine, 
Fresh manhood and maidenhood, willingly bond- 
ing 

93 



Their all to his service, converge at his shrine, 
And hearts shall be mated, though loiiely as thine. 

In the olden time highway bescattered with roses, 
Meet young men and maidens through ages the 

same, 
And feet pace accordant, each right hand reposes 
In one even pulsing, each bright eye discloses 
Tlie love that lips speak when they murmur a 

name. 
Thoughts turn from the past, as in present com- 
pleted, 
And see in futurity visions that shine 
Like planets unclouded, twin stars that have 

greeted 
The sight in conjunction of passions divine, 
And hearts shall be mated, though lonely as 
thine. 

Then sigh not, thou lone one, who, ardently 

dreaming. 
Art still far away from thy visions of joy, 
While searching all faces complacently beaming 
For concord of spirit and still vainly deeming 
Each newly found nature as free from alloy : 
The king in his pleasure may beckon beside thee 
Some maiden for whom thou dost hopeless repine 
Or, mirthful in humor, may choose to deride thee 
By richer bestowal than dream could define, 
And hearts shall be mated, though lonely as 

thine. 
Paris, 1865 



THE ISLAND OF LOVE 

Stay, tender thoughts, how sweetly ye beguile 
This lonely evening as ye fly to me 

Like red flamingoes from some tropic isle 
Upon the bosom of an emerald sea. 

94 



An isle the radiant sun hath loved so well 
That it doth blush eternal with the rose 

On every side, in every watered dell 

And fragrant labyrinth its glades disclose; 

Roses that give their hearts unto the sight, 

In amorous abandon to the air 
Their perfume, as a language of delight, 

And spread a fairy pathway everywhere 

Of dewy petals generously cast 

From the abundance of their loveliness. 

That, if Love failed to kiss them as he passed, 
They, dying, would his very feet caress. 

And there are two transfigured in my dream 
Whom Love hath wafted to this isle alone 

To rule its solitude and to redeem 

A wasted past his grace can but atone. 

Nor, granting them dominion, need he stay, 
For all their blood is throbbing with the fire 

Of blissful freedom from the world away, 
And blessed barbarity and glad desire; 

A wild delight in being all apart 

And casting off the cowl of man's despair 

To live in Nature's presence heart to heart, 
With every fearless thought before her bare. 

With arms entwined, they walk their isle around 
And breast the emerald waves that lap its shore, 

Or, on the grassy sweetness of the jjround, 
Lie as the summer zephyr passes o'er. 

Then, restless from abounding life renewed, 
They scale the cliffs and gaze upon the sea, 

With all its mystic energy imbued 
And, like its ever ranging billows, free. 

95 



Tn joyous heart descendingf, they evade 
The tangled branches arching overhead 

With cUistered roses, and, from glade to glade. 
Wind onward by some new enchantment led, 

Until the magic of the twilight hour 
Makes every cloud a rosy isle above. 

And then, beneath some crimson petalled bower, 
Tliey yield them to an ecstasy of love. 

The silver moon amid the east appears. 
And still are long and ardent kisses pressed, 

And eyes are limpid as with blissful tears 

Before the twain are clasped in perfect rest. 

So day by day and night by night they live 
In purest joy of Nature's high intent 

That each from heart and mind and strength 
should give 
The best that she hath given to be spent. 

And, in a trust that never doubt obscures, 
And in a bounty measureless as light. 

Their souls serenely reign, their love endures 
Without a care and gathers newer might 

And newer beauty. As their bowers gain 
An opening bud for every leaf that dies, 

So Love bestows, for each forgotten pain, 
A living hope that spreads and glorifies. 

No thorn is found upon that island blessed, 
No thought of evil, hate or death invades, 

But eagerness of life and blissful rest 
Abound like songful birds amid its shades. 

O, ruby isle amid thine emerald sea. 

Held by two hearts that Love doth high 
enthrone 

96 



In perfect peace, may none discover thee 

Or mar their bliss who there would dream 
alone. 



LOVE IN SORROW 

To court fair woman's smile when all is well, 
The artful semblance of her love to gain. 
Is pastime any gallant may attain 
For gay conceit by wine freed lips to tell 
But when joy pales at the bewildering knell 
Of sorrow's discords or intolerant pain 
And gentle long forbearing eyes are fain 
To plead protection while afflictions dwell, 
Then may true manhood claim that fate bestows 
A higher mission under gathering care, 
A deeper love than any worldling knows, 
A braver task than earth's distrustful dare. 
And firmly front each threatening wind that blows 
In faith that storms will pass and heavenly mercy 
spare. 

New York, 1868 



CONSOLATION 

In the silence of the night 
When the moon on high is sailing 
Like a lily in the stream 
And its soft pervading light, 
As a dense perfume exhaling, 
Pictures nature as a dream, 

Then, my spirit, if in pain 

Thou dost muse upon the weakness 

And inconstancy of love, 

Lift thee to the skies again, 

To the chastity and meekness 

Of the silvery orb above; 

97 



In serenity so calm 
Learn a hopefulness in waiting 
Until love shall reign in peace, 
Let this heaven floated balm 
Make thy sorrows, now abating, 
In some sweet hereafter cease. 

New York, 1869. 



THE LOVE OF THE IMMORTAL 

Two lovers lingered in a glen when the depart- 
ing sun 
Made beacons of its lofty trees while all the 
grove below 
Spread jealous gloom upon the stream's glad 
waters, which had run 
Impetuously from their birth amid the radiant 
snow. 

And darker were his eyes who loved and softer 
in their tears 
Than any shadow of the rocks upon that tor- 
rent's side, 
And dark his hair, but her's was fair as golden 
sand appears 
When glides the trembling sunbeam down be- 
neath the shallow tide. 

"O, thou strange rapture of my life," the lover 
said at last, 
"How often have I left thee here, forbidden to 
pursue, 
How vainly asked thee whereunto thy gentle feet 
have passed 
And watched with loving eyes thy form de- 
parting from my view. 

98- 



When shalt thou nevermore depart and my abode 
be thine, 
Thenceforth the nest of every hope, the hive of 
all desire. 
Where but thy touch shall bring its bloom to every 
clinging vine, 
Thy kiss the altar of my heart illume with leap- 
ing fire." 

"O, lover fond," soft lips replied, while upon him 
were turned 
Her eyes of that cerulean blue which tints the 
sky of morn, 
"Thy heart already hath a flame as fierce as ever 
burned 
With offerings to jealous gods on high Olym- 
pus born. 

Its earnestness hath kept me here through many 
twilight hours. 
My soul hath half forgotten flight from its im- 
petuous grace. 
And if I loved the earth alone and its beguiling 
bowers, 
My hand should ever cling to thine, my face 
press to thy face. 

But now the season of my love is past, I must 
away 
To that ethereal realm concealed from any mor- 
tal eye. 
Where once thy dream freed spirit flew and, seen 
by mine at play, 
Was loved and followed even here, forgetful of 
the sky." 

The youth grew pale and from his gaze an agony 
of heart 

99 

LofC. 



Sought that fair presence fainter grown amid 

the dusky air 
He knelt to plead with eager hands, unwilling 

thus to part, 
And on his grief distracted lips words trembled 

in a prayer. 

"Have mercy, if thou art of heaven, and do not 
leave me yet. 
How should I know that maid so fair was not 
for love's delight? 
That of the earth or of the sky, thou wouldst so 
soon forget 
The passion thou hast tempted here and take 
thy final flight? 

Is there no tenderness untried which may thy soul 
detain. 
To pity me, no charm of eyes, no witchery of 
lips 
E'en on thy hand that will renew a bliss defying 
pain 
And give back to my breast again the peace 
that from it slips," 

The spirit trembled in the gloom, her blue eyes, 
sadder grown, 
Gave a libation of their tears upon the hand she 
pressed. 
Her light robe seemed a floating mist upon the 
wind whose moan 
Gave dreary echo to the sigh that struggled 
from her breast. 

"O heart too fond, is there no balm of earth to 
heal thy woe. 
No gracious strength to give me peace in realms 
where I return? 

109 



I cannot leave immortal joys to dwell with thee 
below 
And deaden in the love of sense that purer love 
I learn." 

There fell a silence. Then his words impetutously 
came. 
"If earthly passion may not dwell in thy abode 
unknown, 
Then let me cast away its woes, and make our 
realm the same, 
For if thou need'st leave me here, thou shalt 
not there be lone." 

A vision like a rising mist amid the gloom was 
seen 
And naught was heard save eddying stream and 
melancholy wind 
But prone a pallid body lay the air and flood be- 
tween 
And two glad spirits sought the stars to love 
eternal find. 

New York, 1873 



lOI 



POEMS TO THE FAIR SEX 



[Written, in moods of gallantry or great admi- 
ration, to a number of persons ever honorably 
known, or as sentimental effusions of poetic in- 
dulgence, at times without individual subject.] 

A SONG TO NINE 

Ah, many minstrels oft have sung 

Of fair eighteen's attractions, 
I would not still their zealous strain 

Or join their gallant factions 
But, free from wiles that may prolong 

Their trance, I string this harp of mine 
To half their numbers and my song 

Is of the child of nine. 

What step so light, what eye so bright, 
What heart of pureness so divine? 

I sing the child so gentle wild, 
Tlie artless child of nine. 

She lives untainted by the touch 

Of worldly schemes and fashions. 
For love restains, the Winter's course. 

From its corroding passions, 
But, fairy of the Summer day. 

From grove and lawn her light laugh rings 
And, happy as the birds, as gay 

As theirs the song she sings. 

What step so light, what eye so bright, etc. 

Her heart is like a garden ground 

Upon a fair May morning, 
All dewy blooms of gentle grace 

Its innocence adorning, 
And from its depths her thoughts flow pure 

102 



As from its source the mountain stream 
Ere, scattered by the cliff's allure, 
No guidance can redeem. 

What step so light, what eye so bright^ etc. 
Brussels, 1865 



WHAT IS THERE MORE TO SAY? 

O, lovely girl of seventeen, 

H, when thy face is near, 

No weariness can intervene 

And life seems full of cheer, 

If from the glancing of thine eyes 

A magnetism gay 

Robs every thought of vain disguise. 

What is there more to say? 

If I become so strangely bold. 

Sweet maiden, at thy side 

And in my veins, all uncontrolled. 

The blood in fuller tide 

Flows 'neath the sunshine of thy smile 

Like some clear stream in May 

Caressing every flowery isle, 

What is there more to say? 

If hope from her entangled vine 

Long planted in my heart 

Bids blooms of richer hue combine 

And newer tendrils start 

At every sentence from thy lips. 

If I in haste obey 

Each wish that from their beauty slips. 

What is there more to say? 

If there is more, it rest with thee 
The mystery to divine ; 

103 



Beware, a gaze may set it free 
From such sweet eyes as thine, 
A glance of sudden tenderness. 
One sympathetic ray. 
May make my trusting heart confess 
What more there is to say. 
1866 

TO A PRETTY GIRL 

You are lovely, sweet maiden, and know it. 
The glance of your quick flashing eye, 

The curve of your tender lips show it. 
Though these should pretend to deny. 

For who in the world can know better 
Why men often gaze at your face. 

Not rudely, but each one as debtor 
In seeing such beauty and grace? 

Distracted? Of course they confess it. 

You give them a fever or chills 
And, ere they can guide or repress it, 

Their heart shows its yearning or ills. 

And you, with a nice circumspection, 

In merry or artless disguise, 
Turn ever in some new direction 

•When love's soft miasmas arise. 

You are charming, nor may one reprove you 
Because such attractions are known, 

When many of those who may love you 
Vaunt riches less true than your own. 

Such treasures as oft are acquired 
By means of unscrupulous might. 

While nature gave ere you desired 
And waits to enjoy your delight. 

104 



Her gift is a bounty exceeding 
Of beautiful form. Is her grace 

The same in a mind of rare breeding 
We see in an exquisite face? 

O many a maid in confusion 

Has failed, but your delicate art, 

We trust, will perfect the illusion 

And pledge every worth with your heart. 

1877 

BEAUTIFUL GIRLS 

Oh, the girls, beautiful girls, 

What can compare with their spell to delight. 

Flowers and butterflies, diamonds, pearls, 

Peacocks and humming birds pall on the sight 

When the fair girls appear, 

Dainty as fallow deer, 

With eyes as tender and earnest and bright. 

Oh, the girls, beautiful girls, 

They make a paradise only for youth 

When the gay dance every votary whirls, 

When yearning eyes meet in bower and booth 

And the red blood runs high, 

Throbbing to love's reply. 

Holding desire the heart's only truth. 

Oh, the girls, beautiful girls, 

Merry and laughing and blushing and sweet. 

Lovely in drifts of entangling curls. 

Tapering fingers and light stepping feet ; 

Standing so strong and straight. 

Graceful, alert, elate. 

Each with some talisman pleasure to greet. 

Oh, the girls, beautiful girls. 

Winning the wealthy, the brave and the wise, 

105 



Conquering equally ploughman and earls, 

Princes who turn, though no glory denies, 

Careless of fame to rest 

Dreaming upon their breast, 

Lulled by the charm of their amorous eyes. 

Oh, the girls, beautiful girls. 

How they can solace the victims of woe 

That a hard fate from life's chariot hurls, 

Bring back the embers of hope to a glow. 

Give with their touch a peace_, 

By their soft voice release 

Men from all ills that they suffer below. 

Oh, the girls, beautiful girls. 

Turning old age from its sadness of heart, 

Leading it back from the thicket of churls 

Into the sunshine and joy of life's start. 

Scattering weariness, 

While they are near to bless. 

Rending ingratitude's shackles apart. 

Oh, the girls, beautiful girls. 

When my sere life shall have come to a close, 

Like a leaf fallen, that withers and furls. 

Daring to ask for the tears of a rose^ 

Then do I ask their sigh. 

Then would I have them nigh 

By their compassion to bless my repose, 

1891 

SONG 

(Written at Granada, Spain, June 9, 1881.) 

Where is the bird I gave, love, 
But yesterday to thee. 
The bird of sweetest voice, love, 
I heard in yonder tree ? 

106 



I caught it for thy joy, love, 
All treasurers thou should'st own, 
But now I see the empty cage 
And that fair bird is flown. 

Ah, yes, the bird has flown, love. 

Which thou did'st give to me, 

I let it from the cage, love. 

To seek again the tree, 

For all day long its mate, love. 

Was calling it in pain. 

And, as I yearned to have thee near, 

I made it free again. 



FOR COMPANY'S SAKE 

I went to my garden so early one morning 

To bind up my flowers, to trim and to rake 
And paused at a neighboring window with long- 
ing 
That Kitty would chance there for company's 
sake. 

Was ever my fortune so kind as to call her 
All blooming and fair with the roses awake ? 

She smilingly gave me a bright recognition 
And opened the window for company's sake. 

We talked for a while on the whims of the 
weather, 

I gathered a nosegay — the best I could make, 
And, giving it, asked her to enter my garden 

And with me explore it for company's sake. 

Then, all unsuspecting, she came and we wan- 
dered 

About in the paths that we happened to take, 
And quite unforeseen was my heart's invitation 

To walk with me always for company's sake. 

107 



No roses were fair as her cheek when she faltered 
And held me in trance that a whisper would 
break, 

No eyes were so bashful as her's when she yielded, 
To love me her life time, for company's sake. 
Philadelphia, 1866 



RIFTS OF THE LUTE 

I won't dispute, even in fun, John, 

Contention is easy to start 
And too often when early begun, John, 

It ends in a thrust to the heart, 

'Tis a taper that burns to the hand, John, 

A lash that recoils to the side, 
To the vision 'tis Winding as sand, John, 

And brine to the thirsting of pride. 

It shames all the past with regret, John, 

It darkens the future with fear 
And the gem on my hand that you set, John, 

Seems dull when dissensions appear. 

Then give me a kiss and a smile, John, 
Words tender as brought it to sight. 

That my heart may be joyful the while, John, 
And the diamond ever be bright. 
Philadelphia, 1871 



JEALOUSY 

Oh heart, what a tyrant thou makest of me, 
I rule that all gates of my castle are free. 
That she whom I love may go whither she will 
With never a bond or a law to fulfil. 
But thou dost cry out thy impatient decree 
Of pathway or limit and govern me still. 

108 



Stern heart, how revengeful thou makest mine 

arm, 
I tell my beloved that no doubting shall harm, 
That she may meet all whom she willeth to know, 
And see faith but smiling, where'er she may go, 
But thou dost shout forth in a rage of alarm, 
"Count any one gaining her favor my foe." 

Mad heart, how I covet when under thy spell. 
In vain wisdom teaches the present is well, 
That pleasures now known should suffice for con- 
tent, 
That cares gather faster when joys are o'er spent ; 
Thou sayest^ "Give all to me or I rebel 
Until in my keeping all raptures are blent." 



A ROSE OF HERCULANEUM 

(Written at Naples, March i, 1882, to a fair 
Californian.) 

At ancient Herculaneum, 
i So long in death's repose. 

Within a rescued garden hung 
A lonely Winter rose. 

It mused, perchance, of golden days 
When every bloom was there 

To blush beneath the sun's full rays 
And perfume all the air, 

To win the choice of tender hands 

And over some fair face 
Glow, ruby like, in verdant bands. 

Due crown for woman's grace, 

While clear bird voices treble made 

To murmurings of the sea 
And lute and amorous verse arrayed 

Gave charming minstrelsy. 

109 



Then, as the lonely flower mused 

Of how its fate were cast, 
A maiden came whose face diffused 

A radiance of the past, 

The gentle ease, the winsome mirth 

Of balmy days of yore 
Revived in purer kindlier birth 

Upon as bright a shore — 

A shore beyond the dreams of eld 

Lulled by as bright a sea, 
With fame of charms and riches held 

And prophecies to be, 

A guardian of the sheltered place 

No longer willed to save 
The rose due to so fair a face 

And, plucking it, he gave. 

One moment on the stem it grew 

In pensiveness apart. 
The next exultingly it drew 

Life from the maiden's heart. 

But oh, how perilous the joy 

That new existence gave, 
The strange deep warmth that sought employ 

Its lovely bloom to save. 

Its panting petals swiftly spread, 

Infused with wild delight, 
A sweeter perfume from it sped, 

A rich glow met the sight. 

It lived transfigured for an hour 

On that fair breast complete, 
Then, lo, the petals of the flower 

Fell at the maiden's feet. 

no 



Raised from the memory of the past 

To all that hope could lend, 
Life was too rapturous to last 

And briefly reached its end. 

Thus, oft, when those indulged by fate 
Some unthought bliss attain, 

The heart's new realm is all too great 
And all too brief its reign. 



NO GREATER JOY 

Can there be any charm 
The stars above 
To every trouble calm 
Like the soul healing balm 
Of new found love ? 

Hath life the rapture here 
Of two, apart 
From every eye or ear, 
iWho pour their treasures dear 
From heart to heart? 

Can voice have any sound 
More pure and sweet 
In all the air around. 
When tender words abound 
With love complete? 

Doth aught resemble this 
On earth below, 
When every lingering kiss 
A rhapsody of bliss 
Doth long bestow? 

Dearest, we do not need 
To make reply 

III 



Lest any doubt succeed, 

We know love's truth indeed, 

Both thou and I. 



SEA DREAMS 

There is one whom I dream of when rocked on 
the deep 

And hilled by the tumult of billows and spray, 
Who comes, in her radiant face, to my sleep. 

Though lingering ever more distant away. 

Her spirit dwells near me and charms my repose, 
I seem to behold and embrace her again, 

To joy in the fragrance of lilac and rose 

As round me she weaves them in amorous 
chain. 

I speak to her, whispering softly her name. 
Half dreaming the while that she surely may 
hear, 

Half smiling, as if to my slumber there came 
Her ever fond answers in accents so dear. 

So lull me, strong waves, as I rest in your arms, 
Such dreaming is sweeter than vigil awake, 

Bring visions each night of enrapturing charms 
Until all the brightest are true for my sake. 



TO A FAIR FELLOW TRAVELLER 

As on the broad stream of Saint Lawrence de- 
scending, 
We surge through its rapids or mid its green 
isles 
Are lost but in joy while the labyrinth wending, 
How hasten the hours which pleasure beguiles. 

112 



We think not of perils in daring enjoyment 
And laugh at discomforts as fleeting and brief 

While thought becomes mirthful for lack of em- 
ployment 
And words dance to fancies in leisure's relief. 

E'en thus, my fair friend^ when young life is con- 
fiding 
And hope seems forever to dissipate fears, 
May pleasures continue and gain an abiding 
To stem the strong waves that must gather 
with years ; 

Such pleasures as always may bear thee above 
them. 
Such faith as is blessed with a mission divine. 
Then perils may foam but no more shalt thou love 
them, 
Then friendships increase but none surer than 
mine. 

Montreal, July 20, 1870 



TO AN IDEAL 

Belle brunette, when I behold 
All thy charms of form and face, 

Every tale of Orient told 

Comes to thought in living grace. 

In thine eyes and ebon hair 
Moslem loveliness abides, 

Persian and Egyptian fair 
Wield the spell thy gaze confides, 



Spanish and Arabian belles, 
Stirring passion by a glance. 

Beauties of the Dardanelles^ 
Grecian maidens of romance, 

113 



Charmers whose ItaHan bl(X>d 
Sun and song and wine inspire, 

India's cherished maidenhood, 
Mystic sirens of desire; 

All, as I behold thee, rise 
As in day dreams and awake 

Love, stirred by thy long lashed eyei 
To distraction for thy sake. 

Zealously his art equips 

Every sweet perfection thine. 

Paints his bow on amorous lips. 
Makes thy breast his ivory shrine. 

With a smile thou dost command. 
With a gentle voice delight, 

Let thy lingering tender hand 
Bind me liege and faithful knight. 

Loved one, 'tis my heart that speaks 

But I ask no present word, 
Panting bosom, blushing cheeks 

Prove devoted vows are heard. 

Crown my yearning love's advance 

By the rapture of thy kiss. 
In emotion's sudden trance 

Pledging life's unbounded bliss. 

Guarded in my proud embrace. 
Thou shalt have no will to part, 

Thou shalt all the world efface, 
Dear sultana of my heart. 



114 



LOVE IN ABSENCE 

Merry and loving aild true 
Some one has promised to be, 
Faithful away, strong in delay, 
Joyful to hasten to me. 
Dawn on my sight, happy day. 
Bring me her bright eyes so blue 
Softly to say here she shall stay, 
Merr}'- and loving and true. 

Merry and loving and true, 
Why should my heart have a care? 
Brief is the night when such a light 
Makes life's horizon so fair. 
Come to my languishing sight. 
Each thrilling promise renew, 
Thou, my delight, queen in thy right, 
Merrv and loving and true. 
r 

Merry and loving and true, 
Ever so fondly again 
Still I repeat message so sweet, 
Crown of thy rapturous reign. 
Haste, tender lips I would greet, 
Haste, radiant face, to my view. 
Dear arms to meet, bliss to complete. 
Merry and loving and true. 

MY SPIRIT OF SUNSHINE 

My spirit of sunshine^ my fairy so gay, 
How much do I yearn for thy presence today, 
So gentle yet fearless, so trustful yet proud. 
In all thy blonde glory of tresses endowed. 

My nymph of the summer, my heart of the rose, 

How eagerly would I thy beauty enclose 

In arms strong with pleasure and selfish with 

pride 
To make thee a captive content at my side. 

115 



My muse of the hearthstone and fireside glow, 
How joyfully would T thy constancy know, 
Behold thy cheek answer the blush oi the flame 
At every endearment I link with thy name. 

My siren of starlight, my witch of the moon, 
I would thou could bind me in rapturous swoon 
With every dear accent love only can free 
To make me forget all existence but thee. 



TELL ME YOU LOVE ME 

Tell me you love me, dear, tell me once more, 

Echo the music again and again. 
Sweet as if ear never heard it before, 

Knowing I live on its blissful refrain. 

Tell me you think of me often by day, 
Peacefully, tenderly, deep from the heart, 

Wanting me, even if briefly away, 

Full of a trust that shall never depart. 

Tell me you dream of me fondly at night. 
Raising sweet lips for my kisses untold, 

Cherishing now every dear hope's delight 
When my aflFection your life shall enfold. 

Tell me, for each golden word is a bead 
Strung on love's rosary sacred and true. 

Joyfully counted at hourly need, 
To every pledge of devotion renew. 



THE DIAMOND NECKLACE 

Come hither, dearest, in thy rich array 
That I may see if any gift or art 
Or nature can enhance thy loveliness. 
Lo, as I lead thee nearer to the lamp ■ 

ii6 



The diamonds of thy necklace scintillate 

As stars upon a saffron sky at eve, 

Or altar candles when the acolyte 

Doth touch them with a flame at vesper hour. 

Thus dost thou light these gems with downcast 

eyes 
Upon the snowy altar of thy bosom 
And at its shrine my heart doth worship thee. 



SUB ROSA 

(Upon knowing that a gift of rose trees would 
be kept at the recipient's bedside.) 

Thanks, my warm hearted friend, 
For the reply you send 
When you propose 
Hours of rest to spend 
Under the rose ; 

Under each branching tree 
Which, when you musing see. 
Oft may disclose 
Happiest thoughts of me 
Under the rose. 

Then, as you lie awake, 
May care its conge take, 
Each bloom enclose 
Sweet fancies for my sake 
Under the rose. 

And when in weary night 
Dark eyes repose, 
May, to your inner sight, 
Tenderest dreams delight 
Under the rose. 

117 



So, as at peace you rest, 
Life's petty woes 
Shall but in vain molest 
Trust of its true and best 
Under the rose. 



SLUMBER SONG 

Sleep, loved one, sleep. 
Charmed by the rest 
Love giveth best, 
It shall restore thee, 
Sleep, loved one, sleep. 

Sleep, fair one, sleep, 
Turn thy pure face 
Softly in place. 
Sure I adore thee, 
Sleep, fair one, sleep. 

Sleep, kind one, sleep, 
Close thy true eyes. 
Merry and wise. 
Victors so tender, 
Sleep, kind one, sleep. 

Sleep, dearest, sleep. 
Nestled so calm. 
Soft palm to palm, 
Sweet vows I render. 
Sleep, dearest, sleep. 

Sleep, true one, sleep. 
Cherish no doubt. 
Within, without, 
My faith assures thee. 
Sleep, true one, sleep. 

ii8 



Sleep, brave one sleep, 
Striving alone, 
* Fate shall atone, 
Honor secures thee, 
Sleep, brave one, sleep. 

Sleep, fond one, sleep. 
Thy love is near 
Kissing thee, dear, 
Dream I caress thee. 
Sleep, fond one, sleep. 

Sleep, darling, sleep. 
Let any care 
Flee from my prayer, 
Listen, I bless thee. 
Sleep, darling, sleep. 

OF POEMS TO A FRIEND 

Scarce know I aught of verses I have penned, 

For sentiments have bloomed in words and died 

Full often as unworthy poet's pride, 

But what I write of thee, my charming friend. 

And to thee, thankful for thy greeting, send, 

I gladfully to memory confide 

As a perennial heart growth to abide. 

Whose branches with a clustered bounty bend, 

And though the fruit hath not the ripened hue 

On every stem of many a fairer tree, 

It is forever sweet in being true 

To every grace of womanhood I see 

And all perfected color doth ensue, 

As from the sun, when smiled upon by thee. 

IN HONOR OF A FAIR FRIEND 

Say not, oh lovely friend, that I am kind 
In doing what I may, thy will to please, 

119 



To give thy fancy food, thy leisure ease, 
To make thy laughter's music unconfined. 
Nay, kindness is a favor of the mind 
Serenely given, as one gives the lees 
Out of a wine cup when, on bended knees, 
Recipients may drink with pride resigned. 
But what I do comes from chivalric heart 
Which doleth not but urgeth of its best 
And richest vintages in grateful part 
For the confiding presence of its guest 
And, if the least I do hath any art. 
It shall to all thy noble life attest. 



HEART WEATHER 

When love abides I know not cloudy days 

Or hours of sunshine as I did before, 

I am not saddened when the rain drops pour 

Or joyful when I see the yellow rays 

Of earth's great lamp, but, dearest, when our 

ways 
From dawn to eve are parted, then no more 
Can any pleasure to my heart restore 
Faith that the sun is shining. Lo, I gaze 
Again upon thee and, though dark the skies 
Without to others, I behold them bright. 
For with thy presence happy love supplies 
A supernatural all entrancing light ; 
The weather of my heart rests with thine eyes 
And in their trust I know not clouds or night. 



BEAUTIFUL EYES 

Sweet eyes, O lady, mild and tranquil eyes 
Are those of thine, cerulean and serene 
As Como's liquid depths, when it is seen 
Beneath the morning joy of summer skies, 
Unconscious of the tempests that arise 

120 



On yonder Alpine peaks which intervene 
Between the pine and palm and, from between, 
Send down the paroled streams of victories. 
Do eyes so calmly arched merge with their peace 
The snows of chilling fate for every breast 
And prove that wisdom giveth high release 
To turbulent hearts, or, in the piercing test 
Of hate or love or sorrow do they cease 
To sooth the world and burn like all the rest? 



TO A MEXICAN BRUNETTE 

Thou dost not need to tell me, maid so fair, 

Thy blood is of a stately Spanish race. 

For I have gazed on many a lovely face 

In proud Castile, have sighed o'er raven hair 

Parted unequal, curtaining a pair 

Of eyes bewildering in all their grace 

Of ardent tenderness, have roamed apace 

Where beauty blooms in Andalusian air. 

And at thy sight my vision doth regain 

A rapture of that land beyond the sea. 

Yet, lest I muse a compliment in vain. 

And other likeness may poor homage be, 

Although, when thou art near, I think of Spain, 

When thou art absent, then 'tis but of thee. 



TO AN ARTIST'S DAUGHTER 

Fair friend, when once thy father gave 
The highest yearnings of his heart 

In youthful years of struggle brave 
To conquest in the realms of art, 

He also at love's bidding wrought 
His noblest picture in thy face, 

Giving it soul and gentle thought. 
Joined to a presence full of grace. 

121 



And Art this sweetest heritage 
Hath guarded with a tender care 

To make thy womanhood a pledge 
Of feehngs true and virtues rare, 

To make the spirit in thy breast 
A poem whispered in thine eyes, 

A charm to give the troubled rest, 
A joy to make the weary rise, 

For, princess of her blood, by thee 
And through a nature such as thine, 

She gives her faithful grace to see 
And further mount her path divine. 



TO A YOUNG ACTRESS 

Fair maiden, to a poet thou dost seem 

The incarnation of thy father's mind. 

Lifted in inspiration unconfined 

To high romance as in a noble dream 

Of true endeavor, and, as I may deem. 

Graced from fe. wedded love that well may bind. 

From years of faith and happiness behind, 

A full inheritance of earth's esteem. 

And, thus endowed, while thou mayst act in vain 

The guileful roles imposed at times by art. 

Thou canst but be thyself in richer gain 

When taking any gentle beauteous part. 

Since those who see thy life behold the reign 

Of every glad sincerity of heart. 

Denver, Col., 1900 

LINES INTRODUCING A YOUNG 
AUTHORESS 

Prythee, mine ancient, by this script I send 
A maiden I would have ye holde as friende, 

122 



Seeing she hath so rare and choice a wit 
That of its arte are many bookes writ, 
Which, since I rede and have her goodly known 
Do leave me but with this confusion 
That, whilst I conned tales so fair bedight, 
I greatly wist to have the maid in sight, 
Anon, her knowing with such true liking, 
Her booke's laud I eke forgot to sing. 

Washington, 1892 

THE COQUETTE 

(A Rondeau.) 

You heard me say it, "Must you go?" 

I surely did not mean it so. 

If thus you truly heard me say, 

I meant it quite another way 

And why I said it I don't know. 

Men talk so carefully and slow, 

They measure every undertow. 

But woman's talk is often spray 

And pretty foam and surface glow, 

They like to talk in voices low 

And men who hear it as they may 

Are very often led astray. 

I'm sure it was not "Must you go?" 

Yet — Can't you stay? 

New Orleans, 1892 

PLAY, FOR I WOULD DREAM 

Play, my friend, for I would dream 
And thy music can dispel 
All intrusive cares that seem 
Often in my thought to dwell ; 
Play and, with a grateful heart, 
I shall for a time forget 
Every sorrow that my part 
Is to bear in patience yet. 

123 



Play, that I the while may rise 
From earth's all suspecting throng 
To a vision land that lies 
Higher than the clouds of wrong, 
Where each better thought can breathe 
Freer of ethereal air 
And restrengthened hands may wreathe 
Flowers over past despair. 

There my spirit still shall trust 
In the rare and sweet reward 
Of earth's noble ones and just, 
While they tread its sand and sward, 
Who can yet be so sincere 
That their presence shall redeem 
Hate and faithless passion here. 
Play, my friend, for I would dream. 

Philadelphia, 1867 



A HIDDEN SONG BIRD 

(Verses addressed to a fair Charlestonian after 
hearing her sing.) 

O, why should such numberless blossoms exhale 
Their perfume where mortals can never attain, 

On mountains or fastnesses swept by the gale. 
Their fragrance all wasted, their beauty all 
vain? 

And why should deep ocean forever conceal 
Anemone gardens from wondering sight, 

Rose grottoes of coral no fay may reveal. 
Green traceries spread in an azure of night? 

Fair islands there are and vast forests unknown 
Whose matinal chorals man never has heard. 

Where Nature his struggle of soul may disown 
And bird give its joy but to ear of the bird. 

124 



The wise may proclaim that the God-wrought 

excess 
Of music, of beauty and infinite grace 
Suffices in wildest abundance to bless 
Humanity's toil in earth's loneliest place. 

But when, to some mortals, creation benign 
Accords its best favors with generous hand 

And wills, with an exquisite ease, to combine 
Gifts fitted our spirit and sense to command; 

When animate beauty makes higher appeal 
To vision than earth's choicest flowers unfold 

And melody comes to the ear to reveal 

A conquest of garrulous bird notes untold. 

When all is imbued with the spirit of art 
Concealing in nature the witchcraft it brings, 

When touch of the key board and mastering 
heart 
Stir lover or poet or saint as she sings ; 

Then all soulless charms of the world are forgot, 
The tint of the rose or the song of the bird, 

And earth seems a wilderness where man is not 
And man but an outcast with woman unheard. 

O give such a voice no unwilling retreat. 

Let life's brightest channels its affluence find, 

That all its pure fulness of melody sweet 

May gladden and solace the hearts of mankind. 

Washington, 1886 

AN ACROSTIC TO MISS GERTRUDE 
GRISWOLD 

(Upon her success on the stage of the Grand 

Opera of Paris in the role of Ophelia in 

"Hamlet." Paris, July, 1881.) 

125 



G reat are the triumphs of the sweet today, 

E nthusiastic plaudits greet thy song, 

R ich praise from him who tuned th' immortal 

play, 
T hy voice sustains before the city's throng; 
R are vindication of a school of state 
U nused to favor^ now by thee repaid 
D oubly for honors rendered thee so late ; 
E ach of these joys is destined not to fade. 

G reat is today, but greater are past years 

R ipening the purpose of thy noble heart 

I n high resolve to overcome life's fears, 

S ustained and strong for an heroic part 

W hich makes stage fiction cede to nature's 

truth, 
O, of such zeal was Music's palace grand, 
L ost by an emperor, won by thee in youth, 
D estined to conquer in a foreign land. 



AN ACROSTIC TO EMMA NEVADA 

(Written in Paris in 1882 at the time of her suc- 
cessful debut at the Opera Comique in the 
"Pearl de Brazil." Published in 
Galignani's Messenger.) 

E ncompassed by the homage of the earth, 
M ajestic Cleopatra, Eg}'pt's boast, 
M ade mock of fortune, drinking in her mirth 
A precious pearl dissolved, a treasure lost. 

N ot so hath been the cup of thy true choice ; 

E ach melted drop of the Brazilian Pearl 

V ibrates, melodious, in seraphic voice 

A ttuned to nature's heart. Thou, — yet a girl, — 

D ispensest treasi-re thy true way along 

A nd makest earth the happier for thy song. 

126 



TO A LOUISIANA SOPRANO 

(Written while painting her portrait.) 

The bHss of art is not to strive for gold, 

Though serving it full often, but by song 

And brush and pen to right fate's daily wrong 

And gladden with their treasures manifold 

Those finer natures life can never hold 

Fully imprisoned in its weary throng, 

To greet those rarer spirits who are strong 

In art's diviner sympathies untold. 

So thou, fair lady, with a noble grace, 

Hast given joy of music's genius thine 

To countless auditors and while I trace 

Justly thy beauty, I do but combine 

Study of thy example with thy face 

And tell of others' gratitude with mine. 

New Orleans, 1892 



SONNET TO A CHOIR SINGER 

When I behold thy countenance and know ' 

The life that helped to magnify its grace, 

To bring the spirit present in thy face 

And store thy mind so richly, to bestow 

Sincerity and meekness and the glow 

And balm of cheerfulness, I do but trace 

In thy enchanting song the fitting place 

And garden for such vocal flowers to grow. 

Thou art indeed a living temple fair, 

Thy voice its choir whose anthems never cease 

In memory, thy soul the altar chair 

From whence thine eyes do preach for good's 

release. 
Ah, such a temple, more than any rare 
Cathedral man hath builded giveth peace. 

1894 

127 



A' PARTIN' FRAE MY DEARIE 

(Written in imitation of Bums. The theme 

taken from his one time intention of 

leaving his Highland Mary to better 

his fortune in America.) 

We stood sae dowie on the ship, 

My lass an' I thegither, 

Until the sughin' rope sud slip 

An' part us ain anither, 

I mickle soon to sail awa, 

Whilst she maun stay lamentin' 

Gin I war yet nae free to gae 

Where aye my heart was tentin'. 

I thought my achin' heart to screen 
By smile sae blythe an' cheerie, 
But tears cam tremblin' in my^pen 
A' partin' frae my dearie. 

The rope that tethered ship to shore, 

It owre the side was strainin'. 

But neist our hearts wi torture mair 

Was tighter bond remainin'. 

The croonin' rope would syne be cast. 

The rovin' ship be startit, 

But hearts maun houd thegither fast 

When claspit hands be partit. 

I thought my achin' heart to screen, etc. 

She stood sae lovin' at my side, 
My arm sae warmly pressin'. 
Her touch war like a risin' tide 
O' joy my heart caressin', 
I perrit in ilk gentle ee 
Blue as Loch Lomond's billow 
An' yearned to pu' her pow anigh 
An' mak my breast her pillow. 

I thought my achin' heart to screen, etc. 

128 



Why sud sic een to me be true 

Whase glint hae trapped sae mony, 

"Why sud ain lo'e me, tint to view, 

Wha ha a face sae bonny. 

I dinna ken, my heart is sair 

A broodin' o' its danger, 

It lo'es sae weel, sae fond, sae fair, 

can anither change her? 

I thought my achin' heart to screen, etc. 

But why sud eerie cares be spent? 

1 lo'ed owre weel to doubt her 
When her dear lips their pledges blent, 
An' fain maun lo'e wi' out her. 

She canna lightly tak' away, 
A' that her whispers gave me, 
Nor stint a lo'e sae sweet and braw. 
This lassie sent to save me. 

I thought my achin' heart to screen, etc 

For I can gie a lo'e sae leal. 
An' mak her aye sae cheery, 
An' coddle her cam ill or weel, 
She'll tarry for her dearie. 
Sae, when I partit, fu' o' pain, 
Sic trust was a' cud stay me, 
I maun nae turn or keek again 
Lest crankous dool dismay me. 

I thought my achin' heart to screen, etc. 

1890 

A GASH Wr THE MOON. 

(Another imitation of Burns.) 
Sae I maun nae be ower free. 
Good e'n, auld vauntie moon, to ye, 
Risin' sae braw aboon the sea 
To fash the dark, 
Sae white as highland lassie be 
Wi' out her sark. 

129 



Ye charm the waters' wild commotion 
An', stretchin' hither on the ocean, 
Your siller brig aft gies me notion 
To rin mair near 
An', gin I gash wi' due devotion, 
Faith, ye maun hear. 

Like mony ither ane sae still, 
I hae nae doubt ye listen weel. 
An', for I hae a crack to tell, 
Ye'll nae deny it, 
An', gin ye tent me for a spell, 
Ye'll aye be quiet. 

An', sin' in mony a night ye ken 
Fu' well the leesome pranks o' men, 
Ye'll nae gang jouk ye in some den 
O' cloud aboon, 

Or smile ower crousely a' me when 
O' lo'e I croon. 

Moreowre, a' though I'm nae a ruein', 
Ye schemin' moon, 'twar a' yer doin' 
To get my heart in sic a stewin' 
An' pit o' pother, 
An' kap it yit sae lang a brewin' 
r lo'e's sweet bother. 

Ye ken, aiblins, that last July 

A mond ilk prudent chil' should fly, 

Twa times ye cam' aboon to spy, 

Sic rare proceedin' 

That' gin a heart maun gang awry, 

Tis a' your breedin'. 

An', syne ye set wi' muckle art. 
Whilst a' alane I crooned apart, 
A gleesome lassie young an' smart, 
Sae fu' o' beauty, 
Ye canna gar my yearnin' heart 
Ken ither duty. 

130 



Forbye the guid Lord weel did sen' her, 
Wi a' her grace, a heart sae tenner, 
An' sic sweet consolation len' her, 
Ye'll nae lang wunner 
Frae her een's lightnin' came surrender 
As gleg as thunner. 

But, faith, I canna weel deny 
That; spyin' her, I cud but try 
For sic red rose to a' defy 
An' weave a spell 
To dawt her aye sae tenderly 
A' to mysel'. 

Sic blythsome hours as syne we foun' 

Maun bury care deep i' the groun' 

An' gar auld airth go speedin' roun' 

In unco fashion, 

An' ilke canny star keek down 

In kind compassion. 

Oh lo'e sae puir, sae braw, sae leal 

Maun gie ane pow'r to shame the de'il 
An' saething baith frae angels steal 
An' tenner youth, 

An' through the dowie years reveal 
The heart's aine truth. 

An' thus we sailed awa thegither, 
Ye ken it weel, in sousey wether, 
Sin fairies had the waves in tether 
Baith day an' night, 
An' ye war watchful as a mither 
Wi' joyful light. 

But ye nae ken how, i' the shade, 
The twa three blissful nights we staid 
Sae lang wrapped in ain faithful plaid, 

131 



Fu' sweetly thinkin', 

An', aiblins, losin' maist we said 

Wi' dreamy blinkin'. 

Our peaceful hearts nae muckle mair 
O' joy maun spier, when at the shore, 
Our way thegither maist was o'er 
For yet awhile. 

Faith, ye war jealous o' your pow'r 
To sae beguile. 

An' syne the partin' hour came nigh, 
When thou, auld moon, my lo'e an' I 
Maun gang frae ither, twa to sigh 
For joy again. 

An' ye to steet your dowsie ee 
Anent my pain. 

An', sin' a mond ha" gaed awa, 
Ye come again sae white an' braw, 
Feignin' ye canna trow of a' 
The cants ye played me 
An' wi' your simmer visits twa 
Sic passion gied me. 

I rede ye'r nae alane sae charmin' 

An stark to wrack me wi' alarmin' 

That ony skaith my lo'e is harmin' 

By sair delay. 

But, gin she keeks ye now, how charmin' 

Your tenner ray. 

Hand her aye in your sweetest keepin' 

That leel awake or peaceful sleepin' 

She'll tarry for our harvest reapin' 

O' couthie bliss. 

Sae, whilst amang the stars ye'r creepin' 

Gae blink her this. 



132 



POEMS RELATING TO PAINT- 
ING 

(The author, upon the approbation of Cabanel, 
entered his class at the Ecole des Beaux Arts 
Paris in December, 1863, chancing to be the first 
American student of the school.) 

MEMORIES OF ART STUDENT LIFE IN 
PARIS 

O, friends who are yet in Paris, 

As I sit at the cool of day 

And rest as we rested together, 

I think of you far away. 

I rise in the early morning 

Again, as I used to do. 

And hasten adown the staircase. 

The darkened hallways through, 

Haste from my little chamber 

Under the roof so high 

And, bearing my box of colors, 

I pass the merchants by, 

The early and noisy merchants 

Of shop and crooked street, 

The coming and parting buyers 

With merry words as they meet, 

The fair faced buyers and children, 

The hungry buyers and old 

Out from their warm or scanty beds 

In the morning air so cold, 

The sturdy bearers of water. 

The porters and men of toil 

In blouse and clattering sabot, 

Passing in wordy broil, 

The pious seeking the altar. 

The "bonne" or the frugal wife 

With milk for the morning coffee 

Or, truly, the staff of life. 

The youth from an all night revel, 

133 



The squad with fife and drum, 

These claim in quick succession 

My glance as they go and come. 

So I thread the Latin quarter 

To the Art Academy gate 

Where the busts of Puget and Poussin 

Look down as if I were late. 

By court and corridor stately 

I gain with hurrying feet 

The spacious and warm atelier 

Where Cabanel's pupils meet, 

Where all the motley assembly 

Of many a land and tongue 

By generous France is welcomed 

To harvest her sons among. 

O, swelling seeds of ambition 

Which these desire to reap, 

Is it well for showers to nourish 

And soil to cover and keep ? 

Are these who mingle together, 

A strange and a reckless band, 

A frivolous rabble of children 

In earnest to reap the land? 

Be patient, sternest of mothers, 

O Art, for the few shall rise 

From the narrow sloth of the many 

And gain, to thy joy, their prize. 

Yet now the wise and the foolish 

Shall long in the crescent sigh 

Or toil as on taunting nature 

They gaze with exacting eye, 

And still the jest and story 

Their hazard of laughter raise. 

The wild debate continue 

With fitful scorn or praise. 

And song shall succeed to silence 

Until, in defiance, breaks 

The Marseillaise in a chorus 

Which ever the soul awakes. 

134 



Ah, bondsmen may cry for freedom 

Though conquered by bayonet red, 

But youthful spirit is humbled 

When by an Empire fed. 

So patriots heed their warning 

And hasten without to eat 

In many a table crowded room 

That gives on the narrow street. 

Then back to emulous labor 

With weary model to cheer, 

Perchance the Patron's inspection, 

Brief words for hope or fear, 

Heard in an awful silence. 

Pondered the week to come, 

Anon, the pose is ended 

We seek the lecture room , 

Where those who shrank from the patron 

Will now, untroubled, survey 

The surgeon's scalpel dissecting 

A suicide's loathsome clay. 

Then, class and lecture over 

An hour or two remain 

To seek the Louvre's rich treasures 

Across the ice bound Seine, 

To gaze at some rare "old master" 

Enthralled and try one's best, 

Heedless of passing stranger, 

To some of its charms arrest — 

Try until head is weary 

And hand would its task ignore. 

Till the sunlight ever decreasing 

Climbs from the polished floor 

And the visions of art, as weary 

Of standing in common sight 

Disperse to their time and story, 

At length, by the grace of night. 

Then back to my humble lodging 

I go at a freer gait. 

Lingering here at a printshop, 

135 



Stopping there to await 
The sequel to some adventure 
Or sad mishap of the street, 
The patient fisherman's casting, 
The passing of pretty feet. 
To see the artisan's witchcraft 
Where block built palaces rise, 
Or muse by dusky ruins 
Where many a history dies, 
I pause at the omnibus station 
And watch the whinnying steeds, 
I wait at any occasion 
When study no longer needs, 
Until the lamps of evening 
Divert from the toil of day 
And eager senses revel 
At feast and dance and play. 

Philadelphia, Feb., 1866 



SKETCH CLUB SONG 

(Read in December, 1870, at a meeting of the 
Philadelphia Sketch Club, of which the author 
was long a member and for some years President, 
before leaving his native city. This song is but 
one of several compositions for special occasions.) 

When the Winter sunset fades 

In indigo and umber, 

Touch the lights and draw the shades 

And count our faithful number. 

Let no sight profane appal 

In our snug sanctorum. 

Brothers, let the hammer fall. 

Welding, now, a quorum. 



Hear awhile the blank reports 
Thundered from committees, 

136 



Then awake to brisk retorts, 

Arguments and ditties, 

Sharpen wits and pencils all, 

Now or never after. 

Those whose fingers make a scrawl 

Needs must draw our laughter. 

^ ^ ^ 

Brothers, who can sing a song 

Joyful in its measure, 

Bearing all our hearts along. 

Grateful to our leisure ? 

Who can turn from smiles to tears, 

Hymning friends departed? 

On the tides of hastening years, 

Let his theme be started. 

No regret the circuit breaks 
Of electric feeling. 
'Tis the missing link that makes 
Light, through love's revealing. 
Memories that fondly reign 
Bind us more than sever, 
And maintain our proven chain 
To scintillate forever. 



FIRST MEETING OF THE CRADLE CLUB 

(Among the members were Bridgman, Harri- 
son, Hovenden, Knight, Mosler, Pierce and other 
artists, and Richard Whiteing, James O'Galla- 
ghan and other writers.) 

Scene, Paris, a street lately "Washington" chris- 
tened, 

Americanized from the old rue Billault, 
A restaurant humble, but tidy and cheerful 

Seductively called by our host "Le Berceau." 

137 



The characters, — all are right jolly good fellows 

Who eat, drink and sleep during most of the 

time, 

But give to full brushes and pens the remainder 

And thaw out their genius in paint, prose or 

rhyme. 

The plot, — is that every round fortnight or better 
The characters meet at the scene of tonight 

To dine, talk at will, sing or tell a good story 
From seven to somewhere preceding the light. 

The larder's resources are rich to repletion, 
For two and a half francs, a good meal, at 
least, , 

Is furnished, and if to three francs we aspire, 
A banquet is promised like Belshazzar's feast. 

And now will the company kindly permit him, 
Who first stumbled into the cradle, to greet 

The children, by mirth loving motive assembled, 
In a short double shuffle of metrical feet. 

Perchance ye are somewhat reluctant to fancy 
The childish reminders of this our nest. 

Ye fathers who flee from the cradle distracted, 
Ye bachelors making its duties a jest. 

The torments of innocent childhood beset you 
No doubt with a keenness ye care not to keep. 

Mayhap an indignant digestion protesteth 
With those who have rocked in the lap of the 
deep. 

And, even, there may be complacent among us 
Some wanderer who, beyond far western plains, 

Has wearily shaken the cradle of fortune 

And found yellow sand but the sum of his 
gains. 

138 



Yet spurn not the cradle, we all there have rested 
And all may in some tender pleasure agree, 

Our infants from Boston may find this, in symbol, 
Their cradle of liberty over the sea. 

Our Yankees may all yield to jollity's impulse. 
With the name of their great fellow country- 
man near, 
The Washington opening good things from 
Britain, 
Not the Washington, this time, superb and 
austere. 

And those of our infants from mother Brittania 
Can find in our Berceau a patriot's mirth. 

For what is their ocean rocked isle but a cradle 
Of empire reaching the ends of the earth. 

Our Gallic good comrades, if any we welcome. 
Yield nothing to others in art to be gay. 

Or in talent to rock any sort of construction. 
Whether cradles or cabinets come in theif way. 

Then hail to our cradle, full oft may we throng it. 
In brotherly revelry rocking our wits. 

Again we shall take to the bottle contented. 
And cry for it hot, as the season befits ; 

Again we shall laugh at the toys of the moment. 
And break them when scarce our pleasure be- 
gins. 

Again shall the bon-bons of little diversions 
Suffice to distract us from life's hidden pins. 

Our chairman, instead of a mallet, shall flourish 
A rattle to summon attention to speech. 

Let all the good children then do their endeavor 
To cater the pleasure expected from each, 

139 



That life in its leisure may grow in good feeling, 

And we, fortune's children, full little may 

weep, 

While living our day of mixed care and rejoicing. 

Until death, in the darkness, shall rock us to 

sleep. 

Paris, 1879. Note. The writer was Secre- 
tary of the Cradle Club for the year it continued 
and then of the "Pen and Pencil Club," which 
succeeded it. 

TO A SUMMER COMPANION 
(In acknowledgment of Verses.) 
Your verses come as if they knew 
My mind and made a sweet reply, 
For memories of when I drew 
That mountain brook, which might defy 
My varied colors, often throng 
Upon me, dreams of when we sought 
A friendship, when your book and song 
And fancies added charm to thought. 

The sketch shall long to me recall 
The converse of those summer days, 
Such sympathies as gently fall 
On one who mounts Art's higher ways, 
Where genius oft is but a name 
For inspiration friends awake. 
So I may strive for greater fame 
From future pictures for your sake. 

White Mountains, 1867 

PETER PAUL RUBENS 

"What king hath rule in Antwerp? Dost thou 

ask? 
Behold, good sir, two stately mansions there. 
Close rivals on a widening thoroughfare, 

140 



Beguiling history with a modern mask 

And empty in their dignity. The task 

Of kingship one may claim as lawful share 

For Belgium's living, gentle natured heir, 

Witless of what it is in fame to bask, 

But through the other do the echoes ring 

Of Glory's voice unceasingly to hold 

The long dead Rubens as the living king 

Of Antwerp's people and the red and gold 

Of his winged brush a world wide charm to bring 

A host of pilgrims to his city old. 

Antwerp, 1880 

IDEAL AND REALITY 

Are they pure, those souls that revel 
On the glowing clouds of art, 

Do they live above the level 
Of the tempted earth apart? 

Are they in divine ambition, 
Cleansed from covetous desire. 

Guarded from the world's contrition 
By a spiritual fire? 

Do the painter and the poet 

And the singer of the song 
Seize the higher grace and show it 

In a knightly manhood strong? 

These, ah gentle maid, may render 

To thy hope a fair reply, 
Vowing Art a chaste defender 

Sent to earth to purify. 

But they are the slaves of beauty 
And, athwart their higher will, 

What her charms provoke is duty. 
She can loose or bind them still. 

Washington, 1892 

141 



BARREN TECHNIQUE 

Words, pigments, notes ; notes, pigments, words 

again, 
By long haired garrulous egotists are taught 
In juggled combinations, meaning naught 
Without majestic purpose of the brain 
In pregnancy ; yet vapid rhymesters strain, 
With mystic medieval phrases fraught, 
And daubers gloat o'er trivial subjects sought 
And music's mimics exercise in pain, 
All laboring long, and some with nimble skill 
Of technique gaining plaudits, but the blind 
To Art's high need swarm through her valleys 

still. 
Their treasure in a napkin's folds confined, 
Their toil an empty craft, without the will 
Or power to vitalize her noble mind. 
1903 



THE APOSTLES OF ART 

Were Art her chief apostles to define 
In realms of glory, color would enthrone 
Titian, Paolo, Rubens, Georgione. 
Neath Angelo's and Raphael's rapt design 
Di Vinci's and Del Sarto's works combine. 
While, for consummate atmosphere and tone, 
With Rembrandt and Velasquez nigh alone, 
Corregio and Murillo next in line 
Complete the twelve immortals, all confessed 
Mighty in skill of individual hand 
And each of other's grace in part possessed ; 
Yet, most beloved of Art, supremely stand 
Titian, Velasquez, Rembrandt, fully blessed. 
With all her magic power at their qommand. 

1903 

142 



BEAUTY'S GIFT TO ART 



A painter, at his easel stood 

One morning, in a troubled mood. 

He strove to nurture far apart 

From its own clime, his growth of art — 

That precious graft upon his soul 

Intrusted where Italian skies 

Invoke each budding plant to rise 

And make all severed branches whole. 

About him in profusion spread 

Were gleanings of his absent years. 

On every side and overhead 

Rich trophies of his journeyings led 

His mind to all that art endears. 

Here, patient studies of the past 

Its triumphs to his gaze restore. 

And photograph and dusty cast. 

The dingy books of artist lore. 

And rusty arms, and such refuse 

Of other times and other lands 

As long had passed beyond the use 

Of changeful nations to be prize 

For antiquary's eager hands. 

Or esthete's color loving eyes ; 

These things, through each escaping glance, 

His sometimes weary soul sustained, 

Inciting it to fresh advance 

Beyond the hills already gained. 

He sat alone on cloudy days. 

An earnest analyst of art. 

To follow out the subtle ways 

Of beauty, to control the rays 

Of fleeting light diffused apart 

In shade and penetrate their gift 

Of glowing color. He would sift 

The surgeon's lore to comprehend 

Man's mysteries of form and force 

143 



And ponder, as the pallid corse 

Revealed how Art Divine could blend 

The means of action and of grace ; 

He studied types of age and race, 

The varied fullness of the brain, 

The varying features of the face 

Sufifused with joy, intense with pain, 

Controlled by love, revenge or care, 

Serene in piety or hope. 

Transmitting all throughout the scope 

Of thought and feeling everywhere. 

He drew but added care to ease 

Of observation, for the rule 

And plummet taught him that, to please 

The wise in art, he needs must school 

Presuming eyes to servitude 

Of just proportion, as imbued 

With reverence for embodied right, 

And gather from the architect 

The Grecian's genius to erect 

Those monuments that charm the sight. 

As he persued his volumes old 

Their pages seemed of beaten gold 

From luminous and precious lore 

Of art bequeathed by men who gave 

Their pen scant leisure to explore 

When pencil had so much to crave, 

But every charm of manual skill 

And due relation of all lines, 

Forms, shades and tints that art combines 

To make its higher work and will 

A truth or sentiment unfold 

As chosen nature might fulfil 

The task, his treasured volumes told. 

Then would he rise with newer life 

To guide the rude and swollen stream 

Of Inspiration, he would seem 

Again to dare a charming strife 

That skill might overtake his dream. 

144 



But now, as baffled by the flight 

Of nature, he remained inert 

Before his canvass, while his sight 

Coursed over it as one at chess 

Studies the battle to exert 

Some masked reserve and speed success. 

His subject was a Christian maid 

Who, led by soldiers to her fate 

In Rome's arena, at the gate 

Had paused, in all but soul afraid, 

And knelt to pray a moment more 

For strength to meet the woe in store, 

Her nakedness in faith arrayed. 

A model of a charm refined 

To fill the vision of his mind 

The painter for his work required. 

But such a form as he desired 

He sought at every hand in vain. 

Since willing girls of humble birth 

Or wearying toil or sensual life 

All witnessed mournfully the dearth 

Of nature's loveliness when gain 

Or reckless pleasure or the strife 

With hardship foiled her fair intent. 

True beauty, in the love of praise, 

Seemed, by all inclination, bent 

To court dishonoring desire 

Rather than willing to inspire 

Pure Art's disinterested gaze 

And higher tribute reverent. 

Ah, why should woman best endowed, 

Of no timidity possessed 

Or diffidence of charms confessed, 

Yield much to passion and its blight 

In darker hours and not be proud 

To trust to higher thought avowed 

Her virtuous glory in the light? 



145 



II. 



While such sad meditations flocked 
Upon the mind, a caller knocked 
And then the artist saw a friend 
In years of early womanhood 
Who came on frequent days to lend 
The thoughts of a congenial mood 
To his companionship and gain 
A glad return as all his train 
Of gentle fancies broke away 
From their seclusion, pleased to find, 
Inviting them to airy play. 
The radiance of a youthful mind 
Reliant, keen and unconfined. 
The close companionship began 
When she, a year before, partook 
Of the long trance of those who look 
From day to day upon the plan 
Of ages in majestic Rome. 
Her feet had wandered from the aisles 
And galleries where all the past 
Of sainted art the sight beguiles. 
To seek with restfulness at last 
The studios of modern zeal 
And those whose tenants might reveal 
The sympathies of race and home. 
Thus, far away as she had come, 
She chanced one happy day to meet 
This artist from her native town 
Who there was striving for renown, 
Who told her there its vision sweet 
And said that, if it never came. 
Unwearied love of art would fill 
The cup that he had chosen still 
With joy of life in praise or blame. 
So then, perceiving that his heart 
Was strong, she at their parting gave 
To him a hero's place apart 



146 



And journeyed back across the wave 

And inland from the sparing sea, 

To home and to its level life. 

But this, as newer interests grew, 

Became, by Cupid's high decree. 

Earth's fairest garden when she knew 

The influence of one whose strife 

With worldly craft had brought to view 

A hero in a native field — 

A city banker's clerk impelled 

By honor who, when chance revealed 

The proving of official guilt, 

Disdained complicity and held 

Exposure sheathless to the hilt 

To force atonement. Like a flame 

A counter accusation came, 

Law gave it audience and broke 

The evil foil with full release 

To him it threatened. To revoke 

Suspicion, self renewing friends 

Then found it joy to make amends 

By placing him in high increase 

Of fortune. For a while he sought 

Composure from the battle fought 

Through change of scene, a week he staid 

With distant friends and, taking part 

In their festivities, his heart, 

Through meeting oft our lovely maid. 

The capstone of its altar laid. 

The dreamful week sped on by stealth, 

They pledged their love and parted, he 

To labor in the mine of wealth 

By sweeter motives prompted, she, 

Remaining, to no longer see 

A hill of distant hope or doubt 

Confused before her, but to stand 

In dizzy joy upon it, hand 

In hand with Faith and gazing out 

With dreamy eyes upon her way. 

147 



Months passed ere home reluctantly 

The painter came, whom she re-met 

As those who do not soon forget 

A friendship true. Then, to comply 

With all that such a trust imposed, 

She soon in confidence disclosed 

The history of Cupid's sway, 

For love needs friendship as a song 

Needs harp strings, as a soaring bird 

Needs rest. The streamlet, urged along 

From cliff to cliff, doth gain unheard 

In quiet pools its purity; 

So love, by friendship's judgment blessed 

And honored in its depths confessed 

Doth grow in calm security. 

The girl, thus, with the artist found 

A peace of spirit never bought 

Where worldly thought is closely bound. 

His sensitive perception gave 

A sweet translation of the brave 

And broad man-nature which she sought 

To comprehend, while in her heart 

She mirrored out, through many a dream, 

The attributes which best would seem 

To clothe her love in noble part. 

This sunny day she came to spend 

The last of many genial hours 

Of converse in the haunt of art. 

For soon her life at home would end, 

Since Love stood eager to attend 

Her passing to his vernal bowers. 

Another week and she would greet 

Her lover, fretting at delay, 

Who then would hasten on to meet 

And bear her as his bride away. 

Amid her reveries, she felt 

In this last interview a pain 

At parting, for her friend had dealt 

Only in knightly thought. In vain 

148 



She mused of how to testify 

Her high regard, the while he glanced 

Upon her with awakened eye 

To beauties which might now defy 

His heart, if ever yet entranced. 

HI. 

A gentle knock the silence broke 

And, entering when the painter spoke, 

A girl of timid mien appeared 

Who looked about with hasty eyes 

While uttering confused replies, 

As if before some sage revered. 

A comrade, with the artist's need 

In mind, had marked a certain grace 

Of person and, with thankful speed, 

Had sent the girl to search his place 

With hint of service fully paid. 

The painter, using due reserve. 

With free permission of his friend 

Explained the way that she could serve 

His purpose, if her maiden nerve 

Were equal to his study's trend. 

And bid some relative attend 

If this would make her less afraid. 

But quickly did her crimson cheek 

Reveal uncomprehended shame. 

She hardly knew why Eve should seek 

The vine leaves to dissemble blame. 

Yet shrank to stand as Eve had stood, 

Before the race had tasted sin, 

With no accusing sense within. 

In fearless guileless womanhood; 

As still, in any tropic isle 

Unfound by "civilizing" zeal. 

Would many maidens stand and feel 

No modest fear or sense of guile. 

The painter deemed that it were vain 

149 



To urge her service, for the maid 

Attended but in vacant pain 

And, drawing down a veil, she sought 

To leave his presence when a thought 

Of his impulsive friend delayed, 

Who, rising with impressive air 

And strange authority of will, 

Directed her to linger still 

And bid the painter not despair. 

She said her influence might win 

The girl's assent to his request. 

Might give her strength to serve him best, 

Despite the fear she felt within, 

If her thick veil could serve as mask, 

If, further, he would do his task 

In silence and at distance keep 

That she might feel the less alarm. 

He pledged all that his friend could ask 

Who, as the girl began to weep 

In fear of some concerted harm. 

Bolted the door and took her arm 

To go behind a sombre screen. 

The artist, great as was his need, 

In pity thought to intervene, 

Yet wondered if such zeal indeed 

Would sooth the terror he had seen 

Or find entreaty still denied. 

He waited, as one waits betimes 

At midnight for accustomed chimes, 

Then whispers in the silence died 

But faintly rustling garments told 

That he might yet his hope behold. 

One moment, with discouraged face, 

He saw his maiden sketched reveal 

In every way the need of grace 

For which she doubly made appeal, 

The next he watched, with startled sight, 

A form appearing from the gloom 

Beyond the screen, a shape so fair 

150 



That Psyche seemed transfigured there 
Advancing softly in the room. 
Yet, when it gained the fuller light 
Resplendent in each tender hue 
Of vital nature, though from view 
The stranger's veil its face concealed, 
The artist shrank as if he knew 
The movement of the form revealed 
And uttered, with a vague dismay, 
"Oh, Agnes," but in firm reply 
A feigned voice answered, "Do not lie. 
Paint worthily and I will pray." 
Then to the covered dais went 
That beauteous form of womanhood, 
Stept lightly up, an instant stood 
As muse reflecting ere she bent 
And knelt, an earnest suppliant, down, 
One knee her clasping hands sustained 
As if dependent shackles chained. 
While lifted head its anguish lent, 
Though girt about with sombre brown. 
From his brief trance the painter woke 
As. if some stern magician spoke — ■ 
"Lo, nature here fulfils thy need. 
Seek what thine art can do with speed." 
He caught his palette, piled its rim 
With colors, gleaned with eager hand 
His supple brushes and the dim 
Suggested figure seemed to gain 
A freshness, as in parched land 
Reviving flowers greet the rain. 
While still his eyes in swift command 
Would turn to prompt his touch again. 
Well might they oft and gladly turn. 
By such enchanting vision bound. 
As ceaselessly content to learn 
From beauty ever newly found ; 
Well might they gaze in purest joy. 
Redeemed by faithful art's control 

151 



From evil spell to sweet employ 

As messengers before his soul. 

The invading light of that glad day 

No fairer lodgment found. It sped 

Adown the maiden's neck and spread 

On beauteous shoulder where it lay 

Encroaching gently on her chest, 

Yet ever swaying with the shade 

That told emotion's deep uprest, 

That rose as jealous to contest 

The daring of the light cascade, 

Delighting oftentimes to fling 

Itself along the undulous steep 

And rest where pillowed love might sleep, 

Where rose the shrines his poets sing. 

As -mounds of apple blossoms made 

By fairies in life's fragrant spring. 

Upon the maiden's arm the light 

Swept downward to her clasped hands. 

The magic of the prism's bands 

Tinting the skin's effulgent white, 

Again its happy pathway led 

From ample shoulder and it fell 

Upon her gently rounded side, 

Caressive ere it sought as well 

About her supple waist to glide. 

Then outward flowed, with glowing pride. 

Where full impassioned beauties spread, 

With charm that could all art defy. 

Their bounty over hip and thigh 

In larger light which might compare 

With that upon the bosom thrown 

As a magnolia flower rare 

And two white roses partly blown. 

Three snowy blooms together tied 

To figure female loveliness 

When riper youth's perfections bless. 

Then did the studious painter see 

The grace of dimpled flank and knee, 

152 



Of tapering limb divinely wrought 
In lines no other form beside 
Had ever to his vision brought. 
What need the dainty feet to praise, 
Sustaining on their arches slight 
A frame so just in form and height 
And treading earth as to enforce 
Control, yet leave for subject's gaze 
Light emphasis of beauty's course? 
All this the zealous artist saw- 
In gratefully inspired mood, 
For those of worthy heart who raise 
Their thoughts to bound creation's plan 
With deeper sight all beauty praise 
As heaven's sweetest gift to man 
And see it fade, decay and die 
But as he mars its majesty. 
The artist breathed the purer prayer 
That tempting day and, in the brief 
Endurance of his vision fair. 
Still painted on when, for relief. 
His model sought, at moments rare, 
A change of attitude and filled- 
His mind with groups of loveliness 
Which would in future days impress 
His reveries as, in the past. 
The art of Greece had deep instilled 
Its charm through many a stately cast. 
At length the short delightful toil 
Came to a close. There passed away 
Three blissful hours of the day 
When, rising with alert recoil 
Of patient knees, the maiden met 
His final gaze of vain regret 
And stood, an indolent nymph in sweet 
Transition from enforced repose. 
In witching grace from head to feet. 
Ere springing, at a moment's close. 
From the high stand, she crossed the room, 

153 



Still veiled, and vanished in the gloom. 

The spell was broken. In his place 

The artist sat with pensive face 

And put his implements aside. 

His heart throbbed that so fair a friend 

Could thus her unclothed beauty lend, 

His long-despairing hand to guide, 

The while he wondered if she came 

Before him in adventurous pride 

Of loveliness defying shame 

That his mute heart might burst in flame 

And perish ; if she meant to taunt 

His sight in reckless challenge given 

To love, for which he had not striven ; 

Or might she, drifting onward, vaunt 

Without restraint of maiden fear, 

By new and turbulent passions driven, 

The triumph of her nuptials near? 

In haste these bitter fancies passed 

And higher thoughts of firmer tread 

Ensued, until the doubtings massed 

About her daring impulse fled 

And, in his mind, he saw her kneel 

Again^ in all her loveliness 

Of form and pure intent, to bless 

His honored calling and reveal 

A friendship that could live and trust 

In very scorn of turbid lust 

When Love had almost won his right 

Of sole possession and delight. 

He saw her bravely recognize 

With noble will his dignity 

In art's scant priesthood and devise. 

Through uttermost benignity, 

This homage to to a mind and a sight 

Directed in life's journey long 

By purpose true and honor strong. 

At length the stranger and his friend 

Appeared as they had left his sight, 

154 



The latter bid the girl attend 

Until the painter should requite 

Her service, which, with generous hand, 

He did, unquestioning the demand. 

The doubtful girl but glanced and knew 

The order of the fair one's look, 

Her ears the word "Remember" took 

Ere, gladly turning from their view. 

With air bewildered, she withdrew, — 

Withdrew to leave them in the pain. 

That no dissemblance can dispel. 

Which true friends know who smile in vain 

Before they bid a long farewell. 

But words were due. The maiden broke 

Strained silence with a woman's art. 

"Though they should live," she said, "apart 

In future, she should oft invoke 

The memories of genial days 

Which, there and in far distant ways. 

They passed together and revive 

The all illuminating rays 

Of culture he had kept alive." 

Anon she to the painting led 

Their steps and, in extolling, said 

That by her wish it would become 

Her purchase, to in future rest, 

The inspiration unconfessed, 

A keepsake in her parents' home. 

She gave her hand. The artist took 

And held it but could hardly speak. 

All eloquence of words seemed weak 

In refutation of her view 

Of his refining aid. He willed 

All debt his own, all gold undue. 

A covert adulation filled 

His utterance that his were gain 

Of friendship in such final trust 

Magnanimous, of faith to seal 

His purest pledges and reveal 

155 



All that was in his purpose just 
And equally to manhood true 
And woman, as his soul was due 
To heaven. Thus he might atone 
For feelings art might fain disown, 
Beyond its golden gates dismissed. 
He bent, at length, and humbly kissed 
Her parting hand; — then stood alone. 

IV. 

A wedding drew the eager town 

And promised more for theme and sight 

Than it had ever known before ; 

The pealing bells called gaily down 

To all below, the day was bright 

And many came the sacred rite 

To view and thronged the chapel door. 

The moments hasten. Free the way 

Ye latest and, with friendly pride, 

Let all, on this fair nuptial day, 

Behold the now approaching bride. 

The lovely willful child of yore, 

Who enters with a stately grace. 

And note his honorable face 

Who follows, soon to lead her back 

From hallowed blessing as his wife. 

Let nothing in your favors lack 

And wish them both a joyful life. 

So did he wish, with truest heart. 

Who stood retired in the throng, 

That lonely zealous son of art 

Who lingered in his place so long, 

While last congratulations fell 

Like flowers m the fair bride's course, 

While lovers, who had found their source 

Of hope in wedlock's blissful spell, 

Were dreaming what their fate would tell. 

He stood while yet the organ waves 

156 



Of melody were faintly swaying 
Between the sombre architraves 
And to his soul were softly saying — 
"All carnal love shall briefly end, 
All beauty of the flesh attend 
Age and decay and death, but grace 
Of spirit shall forever give 
The beauty of creation place 
Above all base desire, to live 
In lofty thought with equal part, 
Abounding, joyful, perfect, free 
To every pure and grateful heart. 
And they who thus all beauty see 
And cherish, are, by heaven's decree, 
The loyal sons of noble art." 

Philadelphia, 1868 



157 



POEMS OF RELIGION, SORROW 
AND SERIOUS FEELING 

A MOUNTAIN HYMN 

Almig-hty God, when evening leads 

Me from the haunts of men 
To think, responsive to our needs. 
Of all that from Thy hand proceeds, 

Wilt Thou be with me then? 

Wilt Thou, these mighty hills that rise 

Before my sight, pervade 
As, veiled in azure from the skies^ 
They catch the sunset glow that dies 

From valleys dim in shade? 

Imbue my heart with all the peace 

In which they wait the night, 
Convince me Thou shalt never cease 
To care for those whose wills increase 
As Thou dost give them might. 

Bid faith attend, through spreading gloom, 

The coming of the day 
That hath no ills to whisper doom, 
That hath no chill to close the bloom 

Unconscious of decay. 

These eyes, which find such glad relief 

When evening gives them rest. 
So strengthen, far from sin and grief. 
That, high above this dwelling brief. 
The light may please them best. 

Then shall no late intention turn 
My lonely steps to Thee 

158 



But there forever shall I learn 
Thy praise 'mid saints whose garments burn 
Above the jasper sea. 

White Mountains, 1868 



THE BETTER OFFERING 

Oh let us not only in time of affliction 

Draw near to the throne of our Father above 

When fear of His judgments may be a restriction 
And quench the faint flame we would kindle to 
love; 

When brain is yet fevered by doubting or terror, 
Distracted by sorrow, impatient in grief. 

Bowed down by remorseful conviction of error 
Or swept by emotions to heaven's relief. 

Not only in tears let us near him assemble 
Who made us to smile and be happy in praise. 

Not only approach at His footstool to tremble 
Whose mercy surpasseth the might of His ways. 

Shall He who hath fashioned in strength and in 
beauty 
But see His creations as shattered and stained. 
Be sought but when trials remind us of duty 
And, wearied, repent that His work was or- 
dained ? 

Oh, rather come we as His hand hath perfected. 
Complete in the glory of life at its prime, 

An offering vital in efforts directed 
To purify now an existence sublime ; 

Come we with each faculty eager to witness 
The gratitude due for such bounty and care, 

159 



E'en daring- the hope that He trust our fitness 
To scatter fresh blessings His grace may pre- 
pare. 
Live we in the faith of His goodness, not fearing 
His gifts lest, ill used, they should cause our 
fall, 
But humble and watchful and by them endearing 
Our thoughts of the Father and Giver of all. 

That, when this brief life at its utmost attainment 
Is past and the soul on eternity's shore. 

It may hopefully plead at its final arraignment 
And cast off its armor to battle no more. 

Philadelphia, 1866 



CHEER THEE, DOUBTFUL PILGRIM 

Words adapted to the air of the duet between 
Patience and Grosvenor in the light opera "Pa- 
tience"— "Prithee, Pretty Maiden." 

Cheer thee, doubtful pilgrim, on life's weary way. 
Earth hath no pleasure worthy of delaying. 
Let thy spirit urge thee to the radiant day 
Where pain ends — evermore. 
Here is not thy pleasure, here is not thy treasure, 
Then follow loved ones gone before. 

Bear thy troubles meekly if the way be long. 
He who redeemed thee counted not affliction. 
Let His love sustain thee and revive thy song. 
Why linger — wearily. 

He who bore thy sorrow made for thee a morrow 
When, blissful, with Him thou shalt be. 

In thy toilsome climbing through the stormy night 
Thou art but learning what doth best prepare thee 
For the joy awaiting, for the Savior's sight, 

160 



Still watching' — tenderly. 

Trust a little longer. Love shall make thee 

stronger 
Till, ever, shall thy sovil be free. 

Paris, 1881. 

THE SWEETER REST 
"I will give thee rest." — Exodus xxxiii 14. 

• When, in this life uncertain 

And full of changing scenes, 
We pause before the curtain 

That often intervenes 
To hide our cares oppressing, 

Then come these words so blest, 
"My presence shall go with thee 

And I will give thee rest." 

These words, ah, who shall hear them 

With gladness on his face? 
Not surely those who fear them, 

Unworthy of their grace. 
But he who, least transgressing^ 

Hath striven long and best; 
"My presence shall go with thee 

And I will give thee rest." 

Yea, we, Thy children grateful, 

O Lord, supreme and pure. 
Who know Thy love and, hateful 

Of sin, would seek Thy cure, 
Thy grace, Thy strength. Thy blessing, 

We wait Thy sweet behest: 
"My presence shall go with thee 

And I will give thee rest." 

New Haven, 1880 



161 



ROCKING THE CRADLE 

Written for the paper of a Home for Infants. 

Poor little children, so needing protection, 
Outcasts from many a desolate street, 
Here, by true charity's tender selection. 
Rest may first come to your wandering feet ; 
Sheltered from danger as One in the manger, 
Here angels joy in your slumber so sweet. 

Pure little spirits, to earth uninvited. 
Knowing but grovelling want and distress, 
Here shall your wakening eyes be delighted 
By all surroundings that comfort and bless ; 
Here shall your beating hearts know the greeting 
Of the world's first sympathetic caress. 

Ah, but you cannot see all who are tending 
Every bright day of your happy release 
For, though a few are so faithfully lending 
Daily their aid, that your sorrow may cease ; 
Each hand in giving balm for your living 
Gently is rocking your cradle of peace. 

Washington, 1903 



GENEROSITY 

"The Lord Loveth a Cheerful Giver." 

Rich are the valleys and plains of earth. 

Out of their growing gold 

Giving man's labor and care and dearth 

Bounty an hundred fold. 

While, of the cloud given gracious rain, 

Rivers are sent to the sea 

Which giveth its waves to the clouds again 

In a league of largess free : 

The sun all guiding through gifts untold 

And asking but harmony. 

162 



Deep is the lesson that nature suggests 

Thus to the soul of man, 

If he ungrateful and selfish rests, 

Marring its gracious plan, 

But when the generous heart bestows 

Freely of blessings sent, 

Then it alone all pleasure knows. 

And the Omnipotent, 

Lovingly giving since earth began, ^ 

Asks but the grace He meant. 

Philadelphia, 1869 



A CHARMING SUNDAY IN DECEMBER 

Oh, radiant morn of balmy air 
That smileth in the winter gray. 

Thou art a rescued sister fair, 

Storm driven from the choir of May. 

Peace wreathes her lilies on thy brow, 
Hope shineth from thy gentle eyes, 

Life's gladsomeness thy lips avow. 
Love's spirit in thy bosom lies. 

On such a morn the skylark sings. 
The bare twig yearns to bloom again 

And earth, of her delivered springs, 
Doth new baptismal hope ordain. 

In every vale the patient toil 

Of man and beast hath sweet parole, 

They fret no more the pleading soil 
And grateful bask in rest's control. 

On such a morn compassion's hand 

Doth silently uplift distress 
And teach the heart to understand 

An inner glow of happiness. 

163 



In its pure light, the poet sees 

Some fair ideal, clear to view, 
Clad in the state his soul decrees, 

And knows the joy of dreaming true. 

On such a morn the artless maid 
And hill-bom youth of virgin life 

May fitly have love's faith repaid 
And blissful, whisper, "Husband," "Wife." 

And, in as radiant later days. 

May rapture bless the mother's prayer 

At the glad cry of eager praise, 

"The babe is perfect, strong and fair." 

On such a morn the little child 

Is set again above the old 
To teach life's gospel undefiled 

And all its sunniest truth unfold. 

It is the living, breathing day 

That brings a wanderer home, that frees 
The prisoner, that puts away 

Long debt or gives the sufferer ease. 

On such a morn the mind forgets 
Its enmities and griefs and cares, 

Its sins, its weakness, its regrets, 
And seems transported unawares 

To some new Eden fair and bright 

In loyalty to sweeter truth 
Than earth decrees, to pure delight 

Of endless and exalted youth. 

On such a morn the priest may close 
His creaking gates and hush his bell. 

For nature's bliss gives more repose 
To heart and soul than he can tell. 

164 



Yea, such a morning, festal free, 
The angels open heaven's doors, 

While all its peace crowned jubilee 
On earth celestial glory pours. 

Oklahoma, 1896 



THE GOODNESS OF MEN 

O mankind misunderstood 
In its toil and in its care ! 
What a multitude are good, 
What a host who shout no prayer 
In the temples sought of pride 
And forget to wail for sin. 
Have an impulse sanctified. 
And a faithful heart within. 

Some are evil, but behold 
All the thousands of the street, 
In their duties manifold 
What a throng of virtues meet. 
Patience, honesty and love. 
Courage, honor of command 
Seem to fly beside, above. 
And to lead men by the hand. 

See the factory and the shop, 
Mark the furnace and the mill 
Where the toilers never stop 
Until busy wheels are still. 
Where the young and old alike. 
Whom the needs of labor drive, 
As they sew or plane or strike, 
With their best endeavor strive. 

View the multitude of those 
vServing every household need. 
Toiling low, with brief repose 

165 



Where the highest stairways lead, 
Thus by faithful service done, 
Faithful care of others gain, 
Humble strength sustains the throne 
Whereon idle ease doth reign. 

Nor the fortunate deride, 
Lo, how many give excess 
Of their wealth to hope denied 
That the world may suffer less, 
Give with seen and unseen grace 
Precious hours, acts and gold. 
That, as they have won a place, 
So may others climb and hold. 

'Witness steadfast thousands toil 
On the railway, on the mast, 
Over hard and stony soil, 
Upon buildings tall and vast. 
They who guard the city's peace, 
Who maintain the nation's right ; 
Do our obligations cease 
With the wages we requite? 

No, for goodness every where 
Is a bond of unsung praise. 
Common debt to soften care, 
Common joy our hearts to raise 
To achievement of life's best, 
That each one's allotted skill 
May, by fruits of toil and rest, 
Mighty purposes fulfil. 

Men by want or wealth depraved 
May full oft, where thousands dwell. 
Make a host appear enslaved 
Which they for a season quell_, 
As the reckless fish that dare 
Deadly perils of the hook 

i66 



May encloud, in their despair, 
All the shallows of the brook. 



So the rash who venture wrong- 
May be hidden to the sight 
Of the patient and the strong 
With their purposes of right, 
But, from deeper channels led. 
None the purer flow can stay. 
Ever clearing, it will spread 
And the fate of guilt betray. 

Let a wrong without disguise 
Seek the highway to defy. 
And indignant hosts arise 
To remove and purify, 
To assure the poor relief 
And the weak or wounded aid, 
To abate the pangs of grief. 
And to see the robbed repaid. 

Yea, from innocence of youth 
To the mercy taught of age, 
Good abounds and love and truth 
Are mankind's great heritage, 
And surpass by many fold 
In the wider stream of life 
All of evil briefly bold. 
All the hates and sins of strife. 



Test the erring, the unwise. 
The forsaken and the weak, 
Those who fail of any prize. 
Smitten hard on either cheek, 
Mind or flesh enduring pain. 
Heart or soul bereft of love. 
And how often crime in vain 
Strives a conqueror to prove. 

167 



Yes, the weak do testify 

To the goodness that abounds, 

The unwise cannot deny 

When their fooHshness confounds. 

And the evil feel within 

That their suffering is just 

After turning unto sin 

From the richness of life's trust. 

The creative Soul Sublime 
Hath inscribed on nature's breast 
Perfect law for endless time, 
Hath in man His good impressed, 
And its mighty teachers known 
Through the ages are the yield 
Of a seed perfected, sown 
In mankind as in a field, 

Washington, 1891 



TO HOPE 

Fond Hope, how light and fragile 
Were all the gifts I sought 
When youth seemed long enduring 
And fancy mimicked thought. 
How often would I welcome 
Thy phantom and await 
Some miracle ungranted 
To burst the doors of fate. 

Then did I deem thee faithless 
And would have cast aside 
The benefactions granted 
In grief of prayers denied. 
Love sought to find thee gracious 
And mourned to seek in vain, 
It blessed thee in the rainbow 
But trembled in the rain. 

168 



Now, as a dream made vital, 
I find thee ever near 
And smile when thou art smiling, 
Nor lose thee in a tear, 
For fancy hath the raiment 
Woven by graver truth 
And bears a hidden armor 
Unsought in reckless youth. 

Were thy face turned from me, 

I would not think thee cold. 

Could night's deep gloom conceal thee, 

My arm would still enfold, 

Should some disaster blind me, 

I would not then despair 

And, wert thou wrested from me, 

An angel would be there ; 

For, not the careless servant 

Of every fond desire. 

Thou, Hope, art guide of spirits 

Whose ways have passed through fire, 

Art messenger of mercy 

When souls courageous rise. 

Thy grace is here abiding, 

Thy home is in the skies. 

1869 



NO KING BUT CAESAR 

"We have no king but Caesar." Dost thou hear 

That cry of bitter triumph in the past 

Which through the centuries assails the ear 

As the sad .wailing of a winter blast. 

As the lone shriek of maniac outcast 

Which will not die away? "We have no king 

But Caesar." Dost thou hear it? In the air 

Its wild reverberations onward ring 

With fealty begotten of despair. 

169 



"We have ho king but Caesar." Crucify 
The noble conscience of our hallowed days, 
The days of limpid innocence which lie 
In valleys of the memory, the ways 
Of riper virtue, wide strown with its bays. 
The rapture of pure love in which the heart 
Flies to and fro between its earth and sky; 
Away with these, let crosses upward start 
On every hill that lusts may crucify. 

"We have no king but Caesar." Ah, the tone 

Of the fierce cry is muffled not in years. 

Or in unopened Testaments alone. 

It vibrates louder for our hidden fears 

And through the present haughty passage clears. 

The king is he who lets an evil heart 

Have its own will, who claims no other sway 

Than this beguiling world. " 'Tis Caesar's part, 

Away with any other king. Away," 

Princeton, N. J., 1877 



THE ARENA 

Fret not thyself because of any foe. 

Thou hast two weapons like the bondsman set 
In Rome's arena, one the ample net 

And one the trident for thy strength to throw. 

If thou hast done a wrong thy net should be 
Thy deep contrition cast upon his rage 

Thou fearest, that he may not disengage 
His hands made weak by thy humility. 

Yet, if the fault be his, then is thy right 
A mighty trident. With it be thou bold. 

Not to provoke thy foe but to withhold 
Until his onset giveth cause to strike. 

170 



And, smite not often, if he flee or fall, 

Armed with right, thou hast but to defend 

Thy way to freedom. Hold it to the end 
In patience and thou yet shalt conquer all. 

Washington, 1891 



KING DAVID 

Thou shepherd king, not of the lotus land 

But, as a flame the sacrifice along, 

Leaping anointed on Philistia's wrong 

From Judah's woe; Thou mighty of soul and 

hand, 
Leaving the sheep-fold's vigil to command 
Thy flocks of men, and, in Jehovah strong. 
To temples of the ages by thy song 
Marshalling singers from his heavenly band ; 
We hail thee glorious, but we behold 
With vassal joy, a strife amid thy breast 
Beyond the wars of kings, the manifold 
Yearnings and throbbings of a heart's unrest, 
Seeking the lovely, with desire untold. 
Incarnate or through regions of the blessed. 

Washington, 1891 



IN MEMORY OF MISS M. T. 

Can it be true that her sweet face has gone 
Whose overbrimming gladness seemed to show 
But half the joy her spirit held below 
For every friend on whom its influence shone ? 
Have her skilled hands their earthly duty done 
That from their touch no melodies may flow 
Or form delight or limpid colors glow 
Henceforth for many to her smile unknown ? 
Ah yes, the brightest stars must still descend 
Before the morning cometh, but her soul 

171 



Is surely of that host who yet attend 

To with glad tidings of great joy extol 

In heavenly song the Christ Child who doth send 

Gladness for grief and make the stricken whole. 

Washington, 1892 



IN MEMORY OF C. E. M. 

(A valued friend of high Christian character.) 

"Farewell, good friend." It is not long ago 
Since from thy sight I journeyed o'er the sea 
Saying these words and asking thoughts of me 
Amid the joys thy life deserved to know ; 
It is not long since to the genial glow 
Of my own hearth I welcome wrote to thee, 
When thou shouldst ask of duty to be free 
To take the voyage hope had cherished so. 
But now I bow, for, suddenly, thy soul 
Hath made a voyage meditated long. 
Hath reached secure a far more distant goal 
Than seas may compass and, amid the throng 
Of saints, hath joy which earth may feebly dole ; 
There thou dost bid me share thy home and song. 

Paris, 1879 



LIFE'S BRAVEST 

Who are a nation's bravest in its wars? 
Not those spawned in the mire of the town 
Whose very names are lies, whose deepest scars 
No battle stamps, and whose tumultuous charge 
Is irony to fortune in renown 
Which patriots blush at, lest the blessing large 
Should shame the tainted sacrifice. The crown 
Of oak give rather to those youth who stand 
Persistent, when the tremor of defeat 

172 



Comes from the smoky front, when every hand 
Grasps its due weapon and the many feet 
Are firm, though hearts fly home to distant val- 
leys sweet. 

And when the onset of domestic woe 
Afiilicts the heart through persecuting hours 
Or lingering years, if heaven wills it so, 
Until bright eyes grow dull and tresses grey. 
The bravest are not those whose nature sours 
Amid the storm, whose feet are turned away 
To distant carnivals and sensual bowers 
That thought may taste oblivion of care. 
The brave are those who true of soul endure 
The gaze of quiet neighborhoods and dare 
In lane and field to keep their hearts secure 
Through love of nature's God, whose healing 
touch is sure. 

Princeton, 1877 



HOW LONG? 

How long, my burdened heart, how long 
Shall sorrow its discordance make 
In zealous life and hush thy song, 
Disclose thee faint who wert so strong 
And in the dead of night awake 
Thine anguish for another's sake. 
How long, oh yet how long? 

Like some neglected harp unstrung 

And tuneless in the evening damps 

When only wailing notes are wrung 

By pitiless winds, when sad words sung 

Flicker and die as wasting lamps, 

Like some dire ghost where grief encamps, 

Thy voice cries, "Oh how long?" 

Philadelphia, 1869 

173 



LIFE'S CRESCENDO 

Men dwelling in a valley sigh 

Upon a tempest darkened day 
To see the long wrought ant hill nigh 

Flooded and quickly washed away ; 

Those dwelling on a mountain height 

Sigh for the valley folk below 
Who know not that the clouds are bright 

Beyond as plains of purest snow ; 

The angels, souls of those we love 
Departed, look down on our cares 

From all the joys of heaven above 
And send us courage in their prayers. 

While He who guides and governs all. 
Ants, men and angels, whose behest 

Letteth no flying sparrow fall. 

Shall wing each zeal that would be blessed. 

1903 



VICISSITUDES 

I asked, with venturing heart, for love to guide me 

In early wistful years, 
Unthinking that so speedily beside me 

Sweet love would come in tears. 

I had full many a dream of high ambition 

And felt her regal sway, 
But now, oh sad and pitiful transition ! 

How pass those dreams away. 

Fain would I turn aside from gathering trials 

And reconcile in sleep 
Life's promised joys and arrogant denials 

Which strive the path to keep ; 



Yet time hath no oblivion for the weary 

Beyond the dark to-night, 
And then its cares unwatched, when heart is 
dreary, 

Appall the awakened sight. 

We need attend each day some testing sorrow 

And undergo some change. 
That reckless and misguided hopes tomorrow 

Be led to higher range. 

We need in truer estimate of living 

To reconcile our will, 
Disputing not the way or means of giving 

While gifts continue still. 

But, trusting to attain some compensation 

In life's perplexing course. 
That faith and hope may have one destination 

And pride a true resource. 

So shall bewildered love in future smiling 

Forget its present tears 
And veiled ambition yield a balm beguiling 

The peace of happier years. 

Philadelphia, 1868 

"FOLLOW THOU ME" 

When friends prove false as earthly fortune 

wanes. 
When kindred prove corrupt for selfish gains, 
When sanctimonious men are Pharisees 
And know no brotherhood that mars their ease 
And no religion putting hearts to test, 
The soul might doubt if strife with wrong were 

best 
Did not Christ's all ennobling presence shine 
And strengthen it to mount the path divine, 

175 



THE HIGHER LOVE 

My love, put thy fair hand in mine, 
Our pathways are the same, 
We yearn, at an enduring shrine. 
To Hght the heart's true flame. 
Beyond this brief imperfect way 
A happier life we see. 
We love not what we are today 
But what we strive to be. 

It is the strength, it is the peace 

Of that supernal life 

Which prompts us nevermore to cease 

The soul persuaded strife, 

Which leads us up from earthly things 

And selfish trivial ends 

To such a flight on stronger wings 

As heavenly faith attends. 

Far from the present and above 

Its interrupting fears. 

There dawns a sweeter realm of love 

That amplifies with years. 

That in its purer joy prepares 

Our truth, more dreamt than known, 

For regions where the spirit shares 

The bounty of the Throne. 

May influence of that higher trust 
In grateful souls abound 
And turn our vision from the dust 
To where all grace is found, 
That love may ever mount in bliss 
When plighted hearts agree 
And heaven's life begin in this. 
Through what we strive to be. 

1869 



176 



SOUL LOVE 

Fair and fond one, now we give 

Happy hearted love indeed 
But, if we would blissful live. 

This is not our only need. 
Mocking faith by fairest arts, 

Seeking tyrannous control, 
Vain is oft the love of hearts 

If unguided by the soul. 

Hearts are bubbles in the hand, 

Fragile things on life's steep shore, 
Breaking, drifting from the land 

To be held again no more. 
Girlhood's first unvalued trust. 

Woman's oft regretted dole. 
Hearts in time but turn to dust; 

Love endures but through the soul. 

Passion fed and madly gay, 

Hearts are rash and proud and blind, 
Mocking love's devoted sway. 

Tempting sin to lurk behind. 
Bowing to each gilded throne, 

Pressing on through fair or foul ; 
Trust not then our hearts alone, 

Joy is truest through the soul 

Hearts can harden and betray. 

Hearts are covetous of gain, 
They can bloom a sunny day. 

Fading in distress and pain. 
Like cut flowers, soon to die, 

But love can all fate control 
And the heart all ill defy 

If unsevered from the soul. 



177 



TIME'S CORRIDOR 

O Time, thou sculptor none may vie, 
How are the swift Hmbed years 

So modeled by thy restless hand 
To bind our joys and fears. 

In thy long echoing corridor 

A little space I stray 
To view the statutes thou hast wrought 

Of seasons passed away. 

Some, far behind, are fondly carved 

Of alabaster pure, 
Some in the deep veined marble cut 

Where hopeless flaws endure. 

This stands expectant, with a hand 

Upraised to gain its crown. 
That, wounded by a broken faith, 

Sinks pitifully down. 

One year reveals thy joy of youth, 

A wine cup at the lip. 
The next confronts some taunting woe 

While all life's jewels slip. 

And one at hand in armor clad 

Abides austere but calm 
As patient to await and strong 

To bear life's chain or palm. 

Make thou, O Time, the years unwrought 

Which in my path attend 
So goodly that my heart may praise 

Before thy work shall end. 

1876 



178 



PERFECTION 

Perfection, golden idol of mankind^ 

Our sensuous love is thine, for thee in pain 

Of years we all consummate arts attain 

And foster nature's miracles but to bind 

Upon thine altar ; for thy praise we find 

The flawless gem or flower, the rarest strain 

Of bird or beast and vaunt all beauty gain, 

Whether of human presence, hand or mind ; 

But, when one strives in higher Soul to mould 

His life to its ideals true and pure. 

Then is the common conscience faint and cold, 

Unpanoplied to struggle and endure, 

And he of heavenly zeal must needs be bold 

To mount alone and Christ's reward secure. 

1903 



NATURE'S GOSPEL 

The book of Nature leaveth scanty need 

For tomes of revelation to the mind 

Loving so well it cannot wander blind 

To living gospels. In the patient seed 

Bearing miraculously tree or reed 

Which struggle on to fruitfulness and find. 

Beyond their sleep when winter's shackles bind, 

A life renewed for greater growth and deed; 

In all the subtle powers of earth and air 

And multitudinous suns that shine above ; 

In instincts of creation everywhere 

Passing our wisdom, showing laws that prove 

Man's oracles ; abideth praise and prayer, 

Hope, faith, redemption, aspiration, love. 

1903 



179 



AFTER DROUGHT. 

Welcome, O thirsting earth, the pouring rain, 
Rejoice, thou withered herb, and mock the tree 
Whose roots deep fixed can not yet drink with 

thee. 
Be glad, O dusty field and ripening grain, 
The Maker hath compassion of thy pain, 
His clouds of mercy come in jubilee 
To fill the throat of nature with their free 
Pure draught of life and win her smile again, 
And, O my heart, if thy long drought hath passed 
And showers of hope and faith, of love and joy 
Atone for desert journeying, if at last 
The world hath gifts for thee, do thou employ 
Thy life renewed in every purpose fast, 
Let neither drought or flood thy path destroy. 

Stonyman Mountain, 1900 



THE TRUE TRINITY 

There are three Gods in One, the churchmen say, 

Whose diadems unnumbered tomes prcxilaim. 

No mind, howe'er inspired, can justly name 

Their likeness, throne, eternity or sway. 

Yet, in exalted trust, our hearts obey 

A Rule creative, Love's self-giving flame 

And resolute Zeal for good, — a finite frame 

Of spirit infinite. The heavenly ray 

Our purest souls may solve in colors thus 

Like crystal prisms, but the intolerant might 

Of Arius or Athanasius 

Degrades : One hue of faith may harm the sight. 

While in rich order all have grace for us 

If we but live and grow by their co-operate light. 

Washington, 1901 



180 



IF I WERE JUDGE 

If I were judge, thou sayest, or a king, 
Long shackled right should sooner rise again 
Triumphantly, and wrong endure the pain 
Its craft evadeth. Equity should bring 
Torture to crime and make the good to sing. 
But thou art judge and king of wider reign 
Than throned men, for thou art nigh the strain 
Of humble life and unplead suffering. 
Thou hast about thy path the seeds of wrong, 
Thy foot may crush, ere they grow in the night 
To thorned trees. Thou canst make justice strong 
In hut and lane, thy mind its court and light 
To freely give more speedy bond or song 
Than law's slow grinding Juggernaut of right. 

Paris, 1 89 1 



DEVOTION 

'Tis not because thy God may strike thee dead 
For crime that thou, O mortal, shouldst obey, 
As, in the leash of sin, thy every day 
Is stained before the Vision thou dost dread ; 
Yea, in thy toil, thy pastime and thy bed 
Offences foul thy service and betray 
The hearts of others from the loftier way 
To eat of food on which ne'er angel fed. 
God pities thy debasement and he spares. 
Loving the little thou dost render Him, 
And so not fear, but gratitude for cares 
Countless, should nerve thee. Lust no more 

should dim 
Love for the suffering world, which lifts its pray- 
ers 
For daily Saviors and earthly seraphim. 

Madrid, 1881 



181 



LIFE LINGERING 

As when a bird of passage, having reared 
Its tender brood in some far northern nest 
And found a pleasure in its place of rest 
Which every fragrant, fruitful charm endeared. 
Reluctant lingers, when the leaves are seared 
And gradually fall before the test 
Of the rude northwind conquering the west, 
Flying but when its home hath disappeared ; 
So do'th the heart, in life's decreasing days, 
Seem loth to turn from pleasures of the past; 
In Autumn's glow it marks not Time's decays, 
Persuaded fondly that its joys will last, 
Till, suddenly, the season of delays 
Is ended under Winter's killing blast. 

1880 



TO M. L. O. 

A presence of a beauty rare and high, 

A mind of keen activity and power, 
A courage that could years of toil endower ' 

With cheerfulness, a heart that could deny 
No need about her, pride that could defy 

And hide her cares, a nature that each hour 
Grew in nobility and was a bower 

Of blooming love and faith and charity ; 
These were the attributes of one whose sleep 

Doth now so soon a life of honor encj — 
A life we glory in, the while we weep 

And, for its gentle influence, grateful bend. 
Since God her soul doth in His bosom keep 

And angels all her loveliness attend. 

July 28th, 1904. 



182 



POEMS OF PATRIOTISM 



STAND BY THE FLAG 

When the flag that has sheltered us many a year, 
In whose shadow we knew not the meaning of 

fear. 
Is straining before the wild tempest of war 
And rocking the staff in its treacherous base, 
Shall we let it be swept to the earth in disgrace 
Or sustain it as our brave fathers before ? 
Ah, still in its shadow, we give the pledge here 
That this fair floating sign of the free shall ne'er 

drag 
In the ditches of shame while our nerved arms 

are near; 
In our right, in our might, we will stand by the 

flag. 

When our forefathers, daring to throw off the 

mask. 
That a spiritless servitude carried to bask 
In the favor of royalty, took by surprise 
The earthworks of liberty, they on its crest 
Erected their standard and went to their rest, 
Leaving to us a State that the world's wonder 

eyes. 
But they left a work for us to do. Need we ask 
Is there any behind would unworthily lag? 
Let gratitude prove we are proud of the task ; 
In our right, in our might, we will stand by the 

flag. 

Our work is to take up the flag once again 
And place it, where tempests may batter in vain, 
On the stronghold of liberty. Rally once more, 
Our destiny's task should our spirits impel 

183 



And the unbeguiled hearts of the world wish us 

well. 
On, on, hath such glory e'er called man before? 
What loss is too great? How well worthy the 

pain. 
If, standing at last upon liberty's crag, 
We should plant our trust, a full pledge of her 

reign ; 
In our right, in our might, we will stand by the 

flag. 

Can the intrigues of party e'er cover our eyes^ 
Or hamper our efforts to reach the high prize? 
Shall the pratings of peace clog the duty of war ? 
Is it best to seek motes in the calm eyes of state 
When it strives for a nation unitedly great 
And endures what no other dominion e'er bore? 
In patriot brotherhood let us be wise 
And every dismembering fallacy gag. 
And, until undisputed our proud banner flies, 
In our right, in our might, we shall stand by the 
flag. 

With a future so hopeful of heaven's behest 
Of all great and good things, shall we fail to 

contest 
With a spirit resistless in filial love, 
All the fierce oppositions infesting our way 
But to prove our worth for the crown of the fray? 
Ah, never, but seeking all help from above, 
We will fight on to victory's cheaply bought test 
And, fixing our banner on Liberty's crag, 
Till the sun strikes it last as he sets in the west, 
In our right, in our might, we shall stand by the 
flag. 

Philadelphia, 1862 

184 



PATRIOTISM 

(Part of a poem printed in the Philadelphia 
'North American," Oct. 26, 1864.) 



O, spirit of earth's noblest souls, 

When rights and laws and homes are dear. 
Fill up our hearts like brimming bowls 

And flood the emptiness of fear. 
When dangers threaten and despair 

Pleads weakly in the face of right, 
'Tis thine the nobler cause to dare. 

To nerve with hope, to thrill with might. 
Born 'mid the throes of lands oppressed. 

No terror chills thy heart's full flood. 
Undaunted when wrongs unredressed 

Demand fields crimsoned with thy blood. 
Unfainting when long years of pain 

Or heavy trials bend thee low, 
'Tis thine to proudly rise again 

And gather grander strength froim woe. 
Insult and scorn but nerve the heart 

To bear the judgments that oppress 
And dauntless to accept thy part 

Till forth from grief shall mount success. 
When to thy lips the bitter cup 

Clings till its bloody draught is spent, 
Thy dripping hand shall lift it up 

And God ordain it innocent. 

II 

When in the nation's forum meet 

Her councillors in deep debate, 
And, heavy browed, the most discreet 

Revolve the perils of the state, 
Sift out each lonely voice in vain 

When impulse breaks the solemn spell. 
Or, if seditious factions strain. 

185 



Reprove dismay they cannot quell 
Then, should some nobler mind arise, 

Born for the troubled hour's weal, — 
Soar up, amid the mute surprise, 

In swelling tones of daring zeal, 
Awake dull honor, stir the heart 

With strong and self reliant right, 
Prompt each one to his higher part 

'Till all that hear partake his might, 
'Tis thine, proud spirit, to inspire 

His courage in a fearful time, 
'Tis thine to touch with mystic fire 

And teach man eloquence sublime. 

Ill 

War riseS; like an angry cloud, 

At outraged reason's sad command 
And men with heaving bosoms crowd 

Toward the centers of the land. 
Stand soberly in war's thick Hne, 

Once thoughtless viewed in peaceful show, 
And with strange earnestness combine 

To learn its arts of strife and woe. 
Some hurried weeks of glad relief 

Mid duties new, mid new delay. 
One parting hour of choking grief. 

And marching numbers pass away. 
Ah, well for anxious hearts behind, 

That distance were so kindly mute, 
That no sad whisper of the wind 

Can startle with a pain acute, 
That no deep smothered groan can come 

To tell of care and pain suppressed. 
Lest all unguarded hearts at home 

Might faint with burdens unpossessed. 
For far away^ O spirit strong, 

Thy weather beaten children toil 
In ladened weary march along 

Through slipping snow or dusty soil, 

i86 



And, the broad width of day no more, 

The stars have seen the barren plain 
All dark with heavy sleepers o'er, 

By nature mercifully slain. 
At length, before the drifting cloud 

Upon the sanguinary field. 
Concealing, as a dreadful shroud, 

The perils that the moments wield. 
They wait in frantic thought the shout 

That gives them to the battle's fate, 
In hopeful zeal or anxious doubt, 

With lip compressed and eye dilate, 
They watch the charging columns fade 

And see the bleeding burdens come, 
But still spreads out that dreadful shade. 

Still rolls the bursting thunder on. 

IV. 

At last the sudden summons comes. 

The column starts, the spirit wakes. 
In heavy tramp to throbbing drums 

Fate's plunging road it fearless takes. 
Wild phantoms throng the smoky air. 

Unearthly shocks distract the brain, 
Hoarse rage contends with mad despair 

And passion frees her horrid train. 
A fevered dream of reckless strife. 

Of glaring eyes and clashing steel, 
Of reeling forms and tortured life. 

Of faces raised in woe's appeal, 
Of breaking foes in panic flight, 

Of shout and eager progress on. 
Of the fair banner on the height 

Telling the winds of victory won. 
And then thy sons, O spirit grand, 

Can count their trials all repaid. 
As with dim eyes they see a land 

Redeemed by their undaunted aid ; 

187 



Redeemed for all one loves the best, — 

For weary manhood's happy home, 
For feeble age awhile to rest, 

For little ones in years to come. 
And all the bitter thoughts that rack 

The anxious heart flee quite away, 
And peace and joy come gently back 

To heal the woundings of the fray, 
While on the breathless message flies, 

From mouth to mouth its joy prolongs, 
Mid dancing hearts and brimming eyes 

And pealing bells and happy songs. 

V 

When, for our undivided land, 

Such sons as these thy cause avow, 
We wonder not to see thee stand 

With confident and tranquil brow. 
Before their high pure creed of right. 

Before their fearless leagued array. 
Unfaithfulness shall sink from sight 

And all its bHghted schemes decay. 
Live ever, spirit, in their life. 

Forever draw their hearts to thee 
And joyful they shall meet the strife 

To hail true freedom's victory. 
They shall discern with steadfast eyes 

The highest good of thy rich trust. 
Shall guard unselfishly and prize 

A course unswerving, firm and just. 



i88 



THE MUSIC OF FREEDOM 

(Written in Paris, 1864, on reading of Lin- 
coln's re-election.) 

Over the deep there comes a song 
Swelling triumphant on wave and wind, 
Gathering echoes from far behind, 
'Tis a wild strain and its full notes roll 
Into the caverns and clefts of the soul, 
What may the music be? 
Surely it comes in its notes so strong 
From my beautiful land of the free. 

This is a song that kings know not, 
This is a chorus that millions sing. 
Shouting triumphant till mountains ring. 
Forth from the land of the west it flies, 
From the broad land where all tyranny dies 
Sweeps it across the sea, 
Joyful proclaiming the glorious lot 
Of a nation redeemed to be free. 

Hail to the land with voice so clear 
Rising aloft from its mighty toil, 
Singing the width of its wild free soil. 
With a brave heart and a fearless zeal 
Prompting the strength of the echoing peal 
Thus, like a bold decree. 
Flung to the winds that oppression may hear 
That a nation shall live and be free. 

Hail to the men of mighty youth. 
Born to the land of a wealth unknown, 
Mid its rich hills and its ripe fields grown. 
Putting the problems of age behind, 
Moulding the laws of the world's new mind. 
Laws that in proud agree 
Stand and ordain by their conquering truth 
That all nations shall live to be free. 

189 



A SIGH IN A FOREIGN LAND 

Ah, when, in the day of a nation's rejoicing, 
The patriot, far from his country apart, 

Finds no friendly spirit to aid in the voicing 
Of all the brave anthems that swell from his 
heart, 

When no one shares with him the joyful emotion 
That grows from the thought of a prosperous 
past 

And bursts into flowers of pride and devotion 
As the day comes again, so propitiously cast ; 

It is then he longs most for his country deserted. 
Its altars so freshly adorned by the hands 

Of his friends and compatriots, gladly diverted 
To honor the birth of the fairest of lands ; 

It is then, like a brother detained from the bridal, 
A soldier unable the conquest to share. 

That he sorrows without the relief of confidal 
To friendship attuned to his love and his care. 

Then the heart, all encompassed by throngs of the 
stranger 

Who prize not its treasure yet seek to despoil. 
Withdraws in distrust to its stronghold in danger 

And sighs as the portals behind it recoil. 

But though the long vigils are oftentimes weary 
And sad with the lingering yearning for home. 

They shall not forever be lonely and dreary. 
The day shall dawn brightly, the festival come. 

Inverness, Scotland, July 4th, 1864 



190 



COLUMBIA'S NIGHT WATCH 

(Written in description of the author's painting 
belonging to the Pennsylvania Historical Society.) 

Columbia wanders forth at night 

Among the clustered graves 
That multiply upon the sight 

Where lie her fallen braves, 
The deep wound in her breast is healed, 

The fell blow turned aside. 
But by their blood that wound was sealed 

And for her life they died. 

And she shall nevermore forget, 

But, restless in her sleep, 
Will rise and pace full often yet 

In sad patrol to weep. 
Not bitter tears, for all their work 

Is gloriously done, 
Nor bitterness nor hate can lurk 

In the great future won. 

No fate the happiness can check 

That Higher Grace endows. 
Immortelles shall their green graves deck, 

Wreathed laurels bind their brows. 
But, to pathetic memories 

She deep embosomed keeps. 
Her yearning, grateful heart complies. 

And still she walks and weeps. 

Philadelphia, 1865 



191 



THE 14th OF JULY IN PARIS 

One loves to see the Stars and Stripes aloft in 
every street 
When France rejoices in her day of liberty akin, 
For, when our sister scoffs at thrones and scep- 
ters, it is meet 
The greatest of republics proud should greet- 
ings true begin. 

Yea, well may patriot be glad so often to behold 
On mighty palaces of trade in many a thor- 
oughfare, 
A recognition of the States, or see his flag un- 
rolled 
At many a lower balcony of wandering million- 
aire, 

But most he loves, in narrow streets, remote from 
pomp and power. 
To see, at times, from gray mansard or window 
small and high, 
Where youth or maiden, yet unknown, await 
fame's golden hour, 
Some little flag of freedom blend its colors 
with the sky. 

1 891 



192 



THE GRAND ARMY PARADE AT WASH- 
INGTON, SEPT. 20th, 1892 

Often, amid the fantasies oi art, 

Have we beheld, above some darkened field 

Where war had its cyclonic fury spent, 

A ghostly host exalted on the clouds 

In dim array with banners all outspread 

Like fiery blooms amid its barren spears 

And mounted chieftains who with waving swords 

Flashed wrathful lightning at the opposing foe 

To wrest a victor}^ on earth denied. 

Thus art with fate hath striven, thus the grief 

Of patriots hath turned defiantly 

And bade the armed glory of their hope 

Of yesterday to live forevermore. 

But ah ! how vain this vision to the sight 

When Truth must still, with her impartial hand 

Point to the silent spectacle beneath 

Of war's dark wreck and say "Here was the end." 

How vain the vision and how passing brief 

Its balm to many nations of the earth 

Who sit within their walls and mourn the past. 

Yet if this cup of woe were put aside. 

If by achievement of a Power Divine 

The clouds could melt away, the phantom ho'St 

Could march once more upon the earth again 

In life and strength rejoicing 'neath the sun 

With flags exalted still, though time had sped 

Three full decades of immortality. 

What would the world exclaim? Of lesser things 

Have miracles been woven, but to thee, 

Thrice conquering land of mine, there comes today 

This marvel in its proud reality. 

Here at the heart of its herculean frame, 

This Capital of welded states in one. 

Hath Loyalty her legions gathered in 

As from the hallowed silence of the grave 

To quicken for our gaze. Time far recoils 

And History in glad amazement turns 

193 



Full many a page behind to find the deeds 
Of heroes who confront her yet unbowed, 
Whose heir she is in countless treasure now, 
And, as they speak, she casts her volumes by 
For love of gathering a richer lore. 
Yea^ from the fastnesses of thirty years 
In time's dark canyon, where the thunderings 
Of war's wild cataracts re-echo still. 
There cometh, like a mighty river down, 
A blue clad host of sixty thousand men 
To tread again as comrades, side by side, 
The highway of the glory of their youth 
That here, once more before the final sleep, 
They may renew the rapture all their own 
Of this loved land's redemption from its ills 
And see the wonders by their victory vvTought, 
Singing the thrilling chants of dauntless war 
With a new gladness in the peace ordained. 
Well may they sing, for they can now behold 
How they have fixed by their cementing blood 
The loosened stones of that immortal arch 
Of liberty our fathers builded up. 
Making its broad foundations true and sure. 
So sure and equal in integrity 
That none is slave but he who seeks his chain 
Through idleness and squandering and vice 
And none is master save the man who mounts 
By hand and brain to right of leadership 
Using his powers wisely. Well they sing 
In witnessing the nation's love renewed 
For all its wide dominion. Such alone 
Is patriot faith wherein no selfish part 
Is dearer to the heart than all the land 
From sea to sea united, hand or foot 
Being but dead if from the body cleft. 
Serving but when co-ordinate and true. 
So may this living army from the past 
Muse as it treads again our Appian Way, 
Gazing upon its banners proudly borne 

194 



And fondly on its chieftains leading still. 

The men are whitened with the dust of years, 

The flags are tattered. All the mightiest 

Who led this valiant host live only here 

In hallowed memory, and moulded bronze. 

Their loyal souls abiding in the realm 

Of that great chief and father of our land 

Who ever strove for union and abhorred 

All narrower love and thought, whose monument 

Touches the fleecy clouds that drift above 

The city's gathered festal multitude. 

But, though the patient strategy of death 

Hath wrought a greater deed than earthly foe 

In taking captive fame's first chosen band, 

Our hearts have nothing to abate of love 

For this enduring army in our sight. 

No single valor now doth give eclipse 

To every soldier's loyal knightliness. 

For they are of the people in whose faith. 

Honor and wisdom, freedom hath its life, 

This prosperous land its strength, and we, the 

blessed, 
May now survey in every wide platoon 
Of hardy veterans, not the mournful dream 
Of pictured valor in disastrous strife 
Upon the fields of cloudland dimly traced, 
But the proud victors of a righteous war 
To save our nation, equal conquerors 
Who lead the onward march of human hope. 
Who hear and see the blessings they have wrought 
And know the fulness of their great reward. 

Washington, 1892 



19s 



HUMOROUS AND LIGHTER 

VERSE, INCLUDING 

NUMISMATIC 

VERSE 

A SUMMER MISHAP 

I'll tell you how it came to pass, 

Sit down ten minutes more. 
John, take away Miss Lucy's glass 

And shut the parlor door. 
Well, dear, in Summer time we went 

To use, a year ago", 
A cottage papa could not rent. 

It always happens so. 

Our usual tour we could not take, 

Oh, it was such a shame 
To wear the gowns you helped me make 

About a place so tame. 
I tell you, I had need to pout, 

For sister had a beau 
She caugbt that Spring, and I without, 

It always happens so. 

I did not like him, I confess, 

At first, but one June night 
He entered late. You'd never guess 

It. I sat dressed in white. 
He swept upon me like a hawk, 

Embraced me ! Do you know 
Why lovers kiss before they talk? 

It always happens so. 

What could I do? Before I spoke 
The wretch had kissed me twice. 

I could not scream, 'twas such a joke 
And, dear, so very nice. 

196 



But sister, I should feel for her, 

I thought, and said "Forego, 
What mean you by this freedom, sir ?" 

It always happens so. 

He started, but he lingered still 

And begged me not to tell. 
I promised, for I felt no ill 

And all went very well. 
Save when a few soft words he'd say, 

A "brother's" love to show. 
Until a cousin came to stay, 

It always happens so. 

Maud then was quite a pretty girl 

And looked, they said, like me, 
But such a flirt she made men quirl ; 

Well, one night, after tea. 
We girls apart had settled down, 

Our chat was dull arid slow. 
My music had been left in town. 

It always happens so; 

When sister's beau came quickly in. 

We had turned down the light, 
Maud sat somewhat apart in thin 

Checked muslin, almost white. 
He saw no others in the dark 

And, ere she half could know 
His purpose, kissed her. Spark met spark. 

It always happens so. 

She, full of laughter, broke away 

And hurried out of view. 
He saw me, said "Forgive rne, pray, 

I thought that it was you." 
My sister screamed. He knew the cost. 
197 



"Perfidious villain, go/' 
He heard, retreating. Thus was lost. 
It always happens so. 

Philadelphia, 1871 



FUMIGATION 

The Summer closed and Ethel's heart 
Indulged in frequent palpitation, 

For one young gallant seemed to smart 
With prickly heat of love's creation. 

The day of parting came and yet. 
While Horace wore a face dejected. 

His words of diffident regret 

Were not at all the words expected. 

And why? Her father's skillful work 
As chemist marked rich portion pending 

And Horace, though a stately clerk 
At bank, might still be condescending. 

The fair one at her rural home, 

Passed some days in protracted musing, 
While joys and fears like sea side foam 

Dashed fitfully, to hope's abusing. 

But suddenly the door bell rang rang 
One morning and the servant, smiling. 

Brought Ethel, as she upward sprang, 
A gift of roses most beguiling. 

A card the hoped for name revealed 
And, mutely, its address requested 

Some dainty note, securely sealed 
And by her jewelled signet crested. 

198 



A dozen efforts met the flame 

Ere one acknowledging the flowers 

A rival in perfume became 

'Mid her sachet for several hours, 

Whence, odorous of violet, 

It issued, without more delaying. 
To bear by mail fair Ethel's debt 
Of thanks in words much more betraying. 

Thus to the city quickly flew 

The note and with a host awaited 

Delivery, but, ah, how true 
The danger of a thing belated. 

An epidemic spread abroad 

Made disinfecting methods needed 

That very noon, nor could afford 
The town to let them go unheeded. 

The postmaster left naught in doubt 

But, with a resolution placid. 
He had the letters all spread out 

And fumed them with carbolic acid. 

Alas for love in such a test, 

Alas perfume of sweetest flowers. 

Well may poor Romance beat her breast 
And let her tears descend in showers. 

Fair Ethel's fumigated note 
Was given to her heart's desire 

Who briefly read the words she wrote 
And sniffing, threw it in the fire. 

No saving impulse bade him stop, 
As oft when loving feeling lingers, 

He simply interjected "Shop" 

And went to wash his dainty fingers. 

Washington, 1885 

199 



A QUESTION OF TEMPER 

'Twas in a shop^ a year ago 
That first I found my charmer, 

Nor did, as I was glad to know, 
My unkempt face alarm her. 

Soon was I daily with her seen 
And she behaved so sweetly, 

She was so polished, bright and keen. 
She yielded so completely, 

That oft I held her slender waist. 

Oft to my lips I drew her, 
And my stern visage, care effaced. 

Grew smoother as I knew her. 

Until her habits made me take 

To personal reflections, 
For oft she caused me many a scrape 

By cutting my connections. 

Her temper was not always meek. 
Slights sharply were resented. 

Though when I turned the other cheek, 
She frequently relented. 

I bore with much I won't reveal 

Of faulty inclinations, 
For long I thought her true as steel 

And prized our close relations. 

If blood at times was in her glance 

And got her in hot water, 
I knew 'twas but a circumstance 

By inattention taught her. 

And ventured now and then to use 
A leather strop in season, 

200 



Although one truly may abuse 
This mode of teaching reason. 

Whether from this or other cares 
Her temper quite forsook her, 

She was forever splitting hairs, 
I could no longer brook her. 

She grew so dull I broke the pledge 
And when, no longer trusted, 

She kept me on the ragged edge, 
I shut her up disgusted. 

Another man, to end my woes, 
At length with her departed, 

And to the grindstone kept her nose. 
Nor was I broken hearted. 

For if, in uttermost despair, 
I can no longer praise her. 

Think not I slander woman fair, 
I speak but of my razor. 

Washington, 1886 



THE YANKEE TWANG 

(Tune, "Yankee Doodle.") 

The Yankee has a nasal twang 

And everybody knows it 
But not the nose from which it sprang, 
So this narration shows it. 
There was a very early Yank 

Of pure Mayflower breeding, 
And for a maid of equal rank 
His heart with love was bleeding. 
One night they sat on Plymouth rock 
Before her parents missed her, 

201 



When, lo, he gave her quite a shock 
As suddenly he kissed her. 

He reckoned on "How dare you, sir." 

She couldn't make a wry mouth, 
And he could honestly aver 
He fairly came to ply mouth. 
The blue laws then were very blue 

And such an act was frightful, 
But soon their mouths were fast as glue, 
The sin was so delightful. 

Alas, one mouth did not suffice 
To kiss and tell his pleasure. 
But when did Yankee lack device 
To all his wishes measure. 
He couldn't take his lips away 

And, as his heart grew bolder, 
He wished her to be his for aye 
So through his nose he told her. 
His accent proved so very sweet 

That, since she couldn't shake him. 
She made his heart's success complete 
By nodding that she'd take him. 
Then, when the honeymoon was past. 

He at a codfish dinner, 
Confided to the boys at last 
How he contrived to win her. 

Thus all enamored Yankees since. 

When ardent love disposes, 
Give sweethearts not a chance to wince 
By talking through their noses. 
And, whether Yankees kiss so much 

Or are so imitative, 
The nasal twang 's a local touch 
Of each down eastern native. 

Washington, 1900 



202 



ADVENTURES IN SOUTHERN SPAIN 
AND TANGIER 

Once more in Paris, we again 

Have met, who jogged along in Spain 

Together, happy to recall 

Adventures which united all. 

At Cadiz met, we were not long 

Enchanted by its dance or song. 

Its whitewashed walls or dear hotels, 

Its pealing or appealing bell(e)s. 

We wanted but to get away, 

And innocently down the bay 

We started in a little boat 

To search a steamer far afloat. 

Can we forget our little crew, 

The boy, the aged man who grew 

So weary toiling at the oar, 

The stalwart one who mildly bore 

Us to a floating hulk to wait 

All hungry the decrees of fate, 

The chase renewed and then, ah me. 

That steamer going out to sea. 

And hours on the hulk again 

Ere it returned to soothe our pain. 

Think of the modest little tip 

Demanded for our pleasure trip. 

And then forget in pleasant course 

To England's rock established force. 

With Afric's distant mountains grand 

And Spain's green hills on either hand. 

But what peculiar welcome met 

Us at Gibraltar's parapet. 

John Bull stood with his watch, await 

And one hand on the iron gate. 

"If you're not in," he seemed to shout, 

"At seven thirty, you're shut out, 

I go by military rule," 

It seemed like getting late at school, 

But time was short and, all intent 

203 



To reach the shore our boatmen bent 
Their oars with vigor. On we flew 
At twilight, o'er the sombre bhie 
Of tossing waves and reached the pier. 
All tumbled out twixt hope and fear 
And ran as fast as legs could go 
To reach the gate desired so, 
Our luggage borne by noisy men. 
At length we stood within the den 
Of England's lion, out of breath. 
About us ramparts whispered death 
To any foe but, fearing not 
Their guns, we sought for something hot 
Of other quality and came 
To pay our welcome to the same. 
Two days we wandered in and out 
On donkeys and afoot about 
The barren rock. All human kind 
We saw, but could not monkeys find. 
Then, dauntless, sought their native land 
In steaming to old Afric's strand. 
Five hours on the troubled wave 
White Tangier to our vision gave, 
And all about our steamer drew 
Boats dancing their barbaric crew 
Above, below, behind, before. 
They bore us helpless to the shore 
Half drenched and left us several days 
To learn in peace the novel ways 
Of native negro^ Moor and Jew, 
Of women draped from impious view. 
To scan their costumes, camels, shops, 
Content, meanwhile, to fill our crops 
About a Frenchman's ample board. 
Too soon we all again were stored 
Upon a steamer's crowded deck, 
Escaping momentary wreck 
In seeking it, and then again 
Upon the channel's angry main 

204 



We rolled about in reckless plight, 
Men, women, cattle, all affright 
And sprinkled by the dashing spray ; 
Then in Gibraltar's harbor lay, 
There separated, some to press 
On to Granada's loveliness, 
And others to await a squall 
By sea which rivalled that Saint Paul 
Once kept a log of. Then a day 
At Malaga was whiled away, 
Despite a downpour. All at last 
Together in Granada passed 
Ten days of sentimental bliss 
As if by some magician's kiss 
Restored to youth and days of old 
And Moorish pleasures manifold. 

May, 1881 



THE EAR OF CORN, A FABLE 

(Written for children.) 

Beneath the sunshine of a summer day 
And nigh a farmer's often trodden way. 
Low on the stalk, an ear of Indian corn 
Hung silently, dejected and forlorn. 
Although no blight or insect conld be seen 
Upon its tasselled cone of tender green 
And, in a rift, the rows of pearly grain 
Resembled more a maiden's smile than pain. 

Hard by, an aged tortoise came at length 
Along the furrow with an awkward strength, 
Craning his wrinkled neck and staring out 
Upon the world with philosophic doubt. 
The ear of corn could not restrain a sigh 
And, when he winked with sympathetic eye, 
She cried, "O, tell me, venerable friend. 
Wherefore I live and what shall be my end. 

205 



Thou hast so hard a husk I may surmise 
That many years of Hfe have made thee wise." 
The tortoise answered, "Thou and all thy kind 
The toil of man hath reared that he may grind 
Thy kernels into meal when thou art dry, 
Or feed upon thee green, or give supply 
Unto his cattle. This shall be thy fate." 
"O," moaned the ear, "Am I bom but to sate 
The appetite of hungry man or beast? 
Is all my beauty formed but for their feast ? 
Shall they all higher aspiration rob?" 
"Yes, they shall eat thee all except the cob," 
Replied the tortoise bluntly, "Even this 
They sometimes find for smoking not amiss." 
"And is there no existence sweetly dear 
Where I may live in spirit?" said the ear. 
"Why, surely," snapped the tortoise, "If you're 

frisky. 
They'll take the still out, turning you to whiskey." 
"Ah," cried the tender ear, "Ah, woe is me, 
Who oft have drunk the dew and sunshine free. 
Who once was kissed by butterfly so fair 
And loved him as he floated off in air. 
Who once a locust wooed in green array 
As this I wear, and sang the live long day 
Upon my bosom, until, when he flew, 
I sought to spread my leaves and flutter too. 
Canst thou no sweeter fate to me assure, 
Who long to be idyllic, mystic, pure ?" 
The tortoise groaned. "Alas," said he, "my age 
No brighter future for thee can presage 
Than to be nutriment for toiling man. 
But, lo, there cometh hither one who can 
Perchance inform thee better. 'Tis the child 
No grasshopper can match in gambols wild. 
The farmer's little daughter. We are friends. 
We play at hide and seek and when she bends 
To see if she can find my horny nose, 
Do thou thy troubles unto her disclose." 

206 



It happened even as the tortoise said, 
And when the child bent down her curly head, 
She heard a gentle voice upon the stalk. 
"I never knew before that ears could talk," 
She cried in glee. "Mamma has often said 
Tongues must be still, when putting me to bed. 
And I have minded her. Now, pretty ear. 
Do teach mine how to talk as well as hear." 
The ear began. "O child of beauteous face, 
Thou little fairy of the human race. 
Tell me, I pray, what men shall do with me?" 
"Are you so green as that ? Well, let me see," 
The child replied. "I really must say 
That if they came and gathered you to-day. 
They'd pull your clothes off and your silken hair 
And then, when you were shivering and bare. 
They'd put you and your sisters in a pot 
And cook you all in water, boiling hot. 
Or else, and you might like it more, I s'pose, 
They'd roast you on a fire in your clothes 
With clams and things, and if you understood 
How to behave, you'd come out awful good. 
And there are other things which you might be, 
Now you are green. If you could only see 
The hoe cakes and the fritters and the pies 
And puddings Mamma, when she really tries, 
Could make of you, you'd let me take you home. — 
Ah, well, I see you do not care to come." 
"Oh, thoughtless child, how cruelly you speak. 
Is there no other end that I may seek," 
The ear exclaimed, "to bitter fate defy?" 
"Oh, yes, a lot of things when you are dry. 
Like great big people when they lose their wits. 
If you are broken fine you can be grits, 
And hominy if you are broken big, 
Then you are very good to eat with pig. 
Now, don't you mind, for if unbroken, sweet, 
You'll not be with pig but for pigs to eat 
And sheep and cows and horses." "You will 
break 

207 



My heart," the ear sobbed. "O, then, you can take 

A little choice. You can be ground to meal. 

Fine, soft and yellow, and you might not feel 

So very badly if you knew what good 

Cakes, puddings, bread and other kinds of food 

Were made of you. And then, O, there is mush," 

The child cried joyfully. "In mercy, hush," 

The ear replied. "It goes against the grain. 

It fills the center of my cob with pain 

To hear this dreadful word. Is there no lot. 

Condition, situation, state, begot 

Of gormandizing man that may fulfil 

My need and leave me consolation still, 

Where I shall not the fires of woe endure 

So long, where I may be transfonned and pure, 

Unsatisfying to the appetite 

Of carnal things and mystically white, 

No refuge from the breezy crib that waits 

My dry old age, no hiding from the fates?" 

The child reflecting, seemed to comprehend 

These earnest words, and said, "There is an end 

Which may be just the thing. The fire is hot. 

But you are in a cage, not in a pot. 

And then they shake you, you don't mind a bump, 

And very soon, you only have to jump 

When you are burning. Then you change so 

much 
You wouldn't know yourself. It's just a touch, 
And then they pour you out so nice and light 
And twenty times as big, as snowy white 
As any feather from a fairy's wing. 
Without a taste of any earthly thing." 
"O," cried the pearly ear, "thou lovely child, 
To such a lot I can be reconciled. 
What is the state which thus my hopes exalt?" 
The child said, "Pop corn, but vou'll need some 

salt." 

208 



ENVOI. 

The tortoise added, "You may strive in vain 
A spiritual being to attain, 
For though you pass through fires round about 
And turn your dry existence inside out, 
Without some earthly salt to make you right 
You will, however pure, be tasteless quite." 

Cincinnati, 1890 



THE HERD OF SWINE 

(A Satire) 

A city, as Gadara knov/n, existed long ago 
Beyond the sea of Galilee, as ancient maps will 

show. 
And note ye, busy countrymen, from "Frisco" to 

New York, 
Chicago had a rival old that cultivated pork, 
Which also flourished near a lake and o'er the hal- 
lowed line 
Of Jordan's stream, as may be best for those who 

deal in swine. 
Well, proudly lived Gadara when a Rabbi famed 

of men 
Went over, every home to save, nor thought of 

every pen. 
He passed a graveyard near the town when, lo, 

a madman came 
Upon him from the tombs, his eyes with demon 

rage aflame. 
His tenants found they had to quit the frame they 

racked in sin 
And begged, as in bad odor held, some swine toi 

enter in, — 
A herd of many swine which, on a hillside by the 

sea, 

209 



Were feeding, witless of disgrace or forced ac- 
tivity. 

No man can say why they were doomed to carry 
human woe 

Or down that pleasant mountain steep so reckless- 
ly to go. 

Perchance, possession of man's guilt was quite too 
deep a stain. 

And from life's muddy happiness a death, tho' 
clean, were gain. 

At all events, historic page, suffused with noble 
deeds 

And fragrant with the sacrifice of life for human 
needs, 

Has no more moving spectacle of abnegated pride 

Than those two thousand swine afford upon that 
mountain side. 

The keepers, deafened by the squeals and splash, 
as all went down, 

Cried out, "The devil's in the swine," and hurried 
into town. 

There every dealer in the crowd upon the market 
place 

Heard of the sharp decline in pork with pale and 
frightened face. 

They hastened to the graveyard straight, a mob 
upon their track. 

To see if they could not obtain a possible draw- 
back. 

Regretting, on their troubled way, that limpid 
Galilee 

Was not, for once, as good a brine as the Judean 
sea. 

They reached the fresh disaster's scene .md there, 
among the best, 

They saw the late demoniac quite well and nicely 
dressed. 

He, who had been the hardest case of all the coun- 
try round, 

2IO 



Stark mad, stark naked in his sprees, sat tranquil 

on the ground, 
No more defying the police or closing all the 

roads 
About that graveyard to mankind, or lodged in 

its abodes. 
They took him just a step aside, when somewhat 

free of fear. 
And said^ "You precious lunatic, you've cost us 

very dear. 
We didn't mind if family tombs were rather badly 

used 
Or country relatives were slain or otherwise 

abused. 
We overlooked indecency and all the noise you 

made, 
But now you're past endurance quite. You've 

killed the season's trade. 
Already we have spent enough for damages and 

chains. 
And now you cost no end of 'pig' to taunt us for 

our pains." 
They turned them to the Rabbi then who made 

the madman whole. 
Who thought but of the precioiisness of every 

outcast soul. 
And humbly unto Him they said, "We reverence 

your skill 
In curing the demoniac of his condition ill. 
But few if any citizens in our town's confine 
Are worthy of your grace and, if you can't restore 

the swine. 
Such cures as this are profitless, so. lest your heal- 
ing art 
Should treat more unclean spirits thus, we beg 

you to depart." 
The Rabbi saw the town possessed by that fierce 

legion Gain 
And, willing not a greater task, he left in mute 

disdain. 

211 



The man restored sought passage too, as chances 

in the town 
Xv'^ere poor, but he remained and grew a preacher 

of renown. 

1877 



AN AMERICAN GIRL'S MAIL IN PARIS 

O, concierge, something for me, do you say? 
In that dark little nook where I eagerly look 
When I go or return, be it ten times a day. 
No, those are but circulars, throw them away. 
How in the world do the modistes all know 
That I am in Paris and bother me so? 
Aha ! now you smile. There are letters indeed. 
A flock of my precious white birds of the sea 
Have come to the nest and are waiting for me. 
Quick, let me take them. I'm dying to read. 
But first for a look as I go up the stairs. 
Addresses and postmarks I know at a glance. 
Here's a note from Papa, which responds to my 

prayers, 
I am sure, and contains what he calls "an ad- 
vance." 
My stars ! what a dress I shall have for the dance. 
And here is Mamma's, — a good, heavy one, too. 
Which will tell me of all that is passing at home, 
Of calls and oi companies past and to come. 
And the best of it. Mamma tells just what is true. 
For you cannot trust everyone's gossip, you know. 
Then her last good advice, I am sure she'll renew, 
And, truly, I'll keep it, if only to show 
Dear Mother her girl can be trusted away. 
Why ! here's one from Joe. What has he got to 

say? 
I'll venture he wants some more gloves or a hint 
Upon gentlemen's styles, or some news of Kate 
Sweet 

212 



Touring somewhere abroad whom he wants me to 

meet. 
I buy all his gloves, for I know just the tint. 
I hope he will mention that classmate who came 
Last summer to Newport and was so poUte. 
Oh ! a letter from Belle and another from Sue. 
She'll tell her engagement or give me a cue. 
But Uncle shan't see them. He says he can name 
A score of my very best friends who will write, 
On the least provocation, four sheets every week, 
Too heavy an export of paper unpaid 
Which will certainly injure the balance of trade, 
Whatever that signifies, but it's a shame 
That thus of my letters he'd venture to speak, 
If only in fun. Yet I quickly forget, 
As I read all within them, my eyes sometimes wet 
With tender affection or longing, my lips 
Oft twitching with mirth or in laughter released. 
My cheeks even flushed with the wine of my feast 
Of compliments brought over sea by the ships. 
Ah yes, my dear letters, like seabirds you part 
From the shore of my dear native land and you 

come 
With every loved message and story of home 
And your safe place of rest shall be down in my 

heart. 

Paris, 1879 



VERSES 

(Written to and of a clever young English girl 
in the bureau of a Paris pension. A parody upon 
a song in the light opera "Patience.") 

A jocular eyed young girl, 
A witty "aside" young girl. 
Whose electrical mind keeps the hair in the wind 
Of this sharply defined young girl. 

213 



A go-as-yoii-list young girl, 
A partie at whist young girl, 
Who can win it alone with a pack of her own, 
This imperfectly known young girl. 

A very profound young girl, 
A clever all round young girl, 
A good at a spell or a bell or a swell 
Or a "regular sell" young girl. 

A charcoal and peppermint girl, 
A marron glace young girl, 
A walk in the dark for a feminine "lark" 
In the shade of the "Arc" young girl. 

Paris, 1881 



MIDSUMMER 

(A parody) 

The day is hot and close and dusty. 
It glares and the town is cross and crusty. 
The locust shrieks in the midday heat. 
The cows rebel as they stamp their feet 
And the day is hot and dusty. 

My life is hot and close and dusty, 
I sweat and my temper's cross and crusty. 
My collar wilts from my dripping skin 
And the flies, confound them, buzz like sin. 
And the day is hot and dusty. 

Dry up, wet mortal, and banish sorrow. 

Your clothes will come from the wash tomorrow, 

Your shirt is the common shirt of all, 

Into each bosom some sweat must fall. 

Some days must be hot and dusty. 

Reichenhall, Bavaria, July, 1884 
214 



THE HERRING AND THE LONG CLAM 

(A parody on Scheffel's "Herring and the 
Oysten" (German poem.) 

The herring whom so sadly rash love could dis- 
appoint^ 

Whose nose the cruel oyster had put so out of 
joint, 

To flee humiliation across the ocean swam 
And, as he wandered aimless, beheld a long 
necked clam. 

Quoth he, "Though I intended to yield to love nO' 

more 
And, in its passing weakness, could ever clams 

ignore, 

I never in my roaming have seen a clam like this 
With such a neck for suction and such a mouth to 
kiss." 

The flattered clam received him with neck out- 
stretched in pride ; 

So ardent was her passion, she sucked his nose in- 
side, 

And now at home the herring must with his clam 

repose 
Or, if he seeks to wander, must bear her on his 

nose. 



1896 



WOMAN'S STRATEGY 



Oh! what a hat was on her head 
As she came down the theatre aisle, 
That woman of provoking smile, 
While everybody gazed with dread 

215 



Lest they should never see the stage 
If she should chance to sit hetween. 
She took her place with smile serene, 
To one old man's despair and rage. 

For such a hat no plea presumes, 
It had no blinding little things 
Or wild array of pigeon's wings 
But was a mass of lofty plumes ; 

It towered like a mighty stack 
Of harvest hay, an isle of palms ; 
No cloud of August's sultry calms 
Was e'er so ominous and black. 

To him behind all hope was lost 
And every other man around 
In sympathetic anger frowned, 
The women wondered what it cost. 

The orchestra began to play 

And still the wearer of the hat 

In maddening complaisance sat, 

As careless what the world would say. 

At length the curtain upward went; 
The woman then, her triumph made 
That all should see her well arrayed. 
Took off the hat, as she had meant. 

And all within the theatre said, 
Even the man who sat behind, 
We surely have been most unkind. 
She, after all_, is quite well bred. 

Denver, 1897 



216 



NUMISMATIC VERSE 

Note. — The inexperienced reader of these nu- 
mismatic poems should be informed that the coins 
specified are rare and that rarity and value result 
from the small obtainable number of a piece and 
not from age or denomination. The writer is a 
life member of the Archaeological and Numis- 
matic Society of New York, a member and 
Ex-President of the American Numismatic As- 
sociation and author of "Mint Marks." 

THE AMOROUS NUMISMATIST 

An amorous numismatist 

Met a fair damsel in a grove 
And when he saw he sighed and wist 

To have the maid return his love. 
Said he, "A precious '99 

Light olive cent I have in store 
I treasure much but for thee pine 

And feel I love thee almost more." 
Said she, *T now am quite content, 
My heart and hope are in-no-cent." 

The amorous numismatist 

He wept that she could thus repel. 
"There is no coin upon my list 

That I could love, I think, so well. 
I have a charming 1804 

And both together would I give, 
I'm nearly sure, to thee adore, 

Accepted, and with thee to live." 
Said she, "You dwell upon the cent 
But not upon the cent-I -meant." 

"If," said the sad numismatist, 

"My cents were bored and linked with wire, 
To form a bracelet for thy wrist 

And prove the worth of my desire, 

217 



If all the rarest of my gold 

Were strung, thy tresses to bedeck, 
My silver pieces most extolled 

Were hung about thy snowy neck ?" 
"Ah," laughed the maiden, "Tell me when 
I'll be an acquies-cent then." 



A MISS TAKEN SCENT 

I have a friend who loves a joke 
And knows my taste for copper coin. 

One day we met and, with a poke. 

He said, "Come, Harry, won't you join 

A fellow at his lunch to-day? 

I go where little need be spent 
And, if you'll meet me, I'll repay 

You with a strong light olive cent." 

Although the weather was too hot 

To warrant one an appetite, 
The promise drew me to the spot 

Where sat my friend with visage bright. 

A plump mulatto maiden brought 
The food in such perspiring haste 

That, as she hovered 'round, I thought 
Her odor rather spoiled its taste 

And, pushing by my plate, I said, 
"Come, now, old boy, I want to see 

That strong light olive coin instead 

Which you this morning promised me." 

As Susan to the kitchen went. 

The scamp replied, "Coin? Not a bit. 
I promised a light olive scent 

And there goes all you'll have of it." 

Washington, 1904 

218 



THE OLD LADY WE KNOW 

One day I was studying coins in a shop 

Where the good natured butcher my interest 
knew, 

When an old lady passing out happened to stop, 
Remarking, "My grandfather left me a few." 

I never dropped money so quickly before 
To talk to a woman of any degree. 

I picked up her bundle and opened the door 
And said, as she limped, she must lean upon 
me. 

Of course "1 was glad to be going her way," 
More purchases made I was eager to take 

And, when she was weary, I hastened to pay 
For a lunch and a nosegay and cab for her sake. 

She thought she had never met one so polite. 
When we stopped at her cottage, and asked me 
to call 
Next week, as at present she could not invite 
Her friends as some painters were doing the 
hall. 

I said that old persons were always my joy 
Since being of grandparents early bereft, 
And I longed to know more of her middle aged 
boy 
And her grandfather's life — and the coins he 
had left. 

She believed that a '94 dollar was there, 

A '96 half and a '99 cent 
And asked if such pieces, uninjured, were rare. 

I said I was sure they had often been spent, 

219 



But they might come in somewhere or do for a 
trade, 

I carelessly hinted, and hoped none would see 
Or hear of them. Kindly the old lady made 

This promise until she could show them to me. 

Then, in my temerity, all of that night 

I pictured these gems in my study beneath 

All snug in the fireproof and, at the sight, 

How Johnson and Jones would be gnashing 
their teeth. 

The next week I, surely, of callers was first 
But, much to my sorrow, the lady was out, 

And the day after that, but a gas pipe had burst 
And then for a while she was down with the 
gout. 

At length, when I found her, she said with a tear, 
The coins were too sacred. Was I in the lurch ? 

Ah, not if I knew it. I made them appear 
By giving a "Ten" for the debt of her church. 



t t 



The hoped '94 was a poor '99, 

The '99 cent was a fair '94, 
The half was a quarter, but nothing to mine, 

And the rest — if a pedlar's, I'd show him the 
door. 

When gently I gave the old lady the name 

Of both Johnson and Jones as the men who 
should see 

Her treasures, she said their advice was the same 
On the previous month, in referring to me. 

Published in the "Numismatist" of August, 1892. 



220 



THE NUMISMATIST AND THE BURGLAR 

(Published in the Numismatist of May, 1894.) 

Old Jimmy Snap the cracksman had begun 

To sigh for spoils. He had but little done 

Since last a lodger at the county jail 

And thought of reformation, but the frail 

In moral strength are very easily bent 

And Jimmy had a big temptation sent 

To test him in a certain Dr. Green — 

A neat young bachelor of modest mien 

He chanced to see before his door one night 

Receiving from the postman with delight 

A package registered and sealed with care. 

Old Jimmy watched again and often there 

And still the packages and letters came. 

And colored pamphlets stuffed the narrow frame 

Which Green unlocked for mail when at the Post 

Where Jimmy also rambled and could boast 

That he so closely dogged the doctor's track 

He knew that rarely packages went back, 

And then were much reduced, as he could see ; 

So what could this accumulation be? 

A pal suggested "Hunks of quinine pills 

Or patent medicines to fix the chills. 

Or stacks of every herb and powder known 

To make some patent mixture of his own, 

And pamphlets might be catalogues of drugs 

Or knives for carving stiffs and poor house thugs. 

And letters might be bills or urgent pleas 

For early calls to watch some youngster sneeze." 

"No," Jimme said, "Doc hasn't such a flush 

In curin' folks, I haint observed no rush 

About his place. In fac', it has the look 

Of lighter trade most ever since he took 

To this here package game." "A genteel crib," 

His comrade then exclaimed. "Don't be so glib," 

Was Jimmy's answer. "Doc don't know enough. 

He's clear as seltzer, hasn't got the stuff 

221 



For shady work. He looks with all his eyes 

At every package, sometimes half unties 

The strings and breaks the seals while in the 

street. 
No, he's not in it. Doc is mixed too sweet." 
Soon after this debate a climax came 
And Jim was much more hungry for his game, 
For to the doctor's door a strong team brought 
A safe one morning and the porters fought 
And tugged at planks and pulleys in and out 
Amid a mile of rope or thereabout. 
And nicked the steps, the hallway carpet tore 
And took some splinters off of every door, 
Toiling like ants about a grain of corn, 
While to and fro, exultant or forlorn. 
The gentle doctor ran and failed to see 
Intended callers turn or hear the free 
Remarks of the assembled populace. 
"He's a safe doctor now, in any case," 
Said one. "Yes," quoth another, "For his pay 
He's got a fire-proof to put away 
The dollars that he gets for sugar pills." 
"No," called a third, " 'tis for the folks he kills 
Till he's a chance to plant 'em." Idler's jest 
Did thus with workmen's expletives contest 
Until the evening saw the safe disposed 
Within his study. There its doors enclosed, 
Before the daylight came, the gathered store 
Of those mysterious parcels, lingered o'er 
By the young doctor with the silent bliss 
Of some fond mother giving kiss by kiss 
To her first child in midnight wakefulness. 
Old Jimmy marked the light and had no less 
Observed the safe as it was taken in, 
A second hand one, plates were rather thin 
And might be drilled. The kind of lock it bore 
Was troublesome, he'd picked it once before. 
Some little patience was in order then 
To learn the details of the doctor's den. 

222 



A visit of his pal, pretending pain, 

Brought observations of important gain 

In knowledge of the fastenings of the room 

And further, he had noticed in the gloom 

Some scattered coin and catalogues of sale. 

This put the eager burglar on the trail 

And now the secret of the doctor told. 

So Jimmy felt that packages of gold 

And silver would reward his dark intent. 

But then to choose the time. The doctor spent 

His evenings often far into the night 

Before his treasure, judging by the light. 

Jimmy at length resolved to do his task 

In boldest fashion — shooting gear and mask 

The first night that the servant should go out. 

An opportunity soon came about 

And when the doctor left his open trays 

To serve the door bell he was in a daze 

At sight of the intruder. "Not a word/' 

Cautioned the burglar, as his victim stirred 

As if to raise alarm, "and no pretence 

Of fightin', you'll be safe without defence. 

But show me them there drawers. I want to take 

The medicine that keeps you wide awake. 

I'll make my own prescriptions, all in one, 

And take a good big dose before I've done." 

The doctor, in a torment, groaned and sighed, 

He pulled his tray of half cents open wide. 

There, sleeping in symmetrical array. 

The dates complete in high condition lay, — 

His '93 and '6 and 1802 

And all the precious restrikes. What a stew 

For a collector ! In a moment more. 

He thought, this brutal fellow here will pour 

The lot into his pocket but, perplexed. 

The man behind him simply muttered, "Next, 

You can't fool me with these here little fish." 

The doctor turned indignant, "Do you wish 

To question " Here the burglar said, "Dry 

up. 

223 



Show me the next." This was a bitter cup 

For the collector, since the next contained 

A hundred cents so rare that they had drained 

His profits for a year — ten '93 

Varieties and other '90's free 

From injury and strictly extra fine 

And, best of all, a handsome '99, 

Then 1804 and '9 almost as good 

And '23 quite fine. The burglar stood 

A moment ere he shoved the treasure back 

And said. "Doc, you are ofif the center track. 

I haint come here for truck the like o' this. 

Now, durn it, man, be quick." The Doctor's bliss 

A moment held him as if petrified, 

Then half in doubt, he, from another slide, 

Drew out his sets of 2's and 3's and 5's, 

All proofs or nearly so. "Some Doctors' lives 

Seem cheap as patients' does," old Jimmy said, 

Rapping his pallid victim on the head ; 

"Keep these for organ grinders, bigger loot 

Is what I'm after, or you'll hear me shoot." 

"But really," said the Doctor, terrified, 

"I haven't any better things aside. 

My half dimes, which I wish so to perfect, 

Have very few that one might call select. 

My dimes are poor in every early date, 

My quarters are not yet in any state 

To show, my halves I have but just begun. 

Of dollars, I'm ashamed to say I've none. 

Look at these trays of silver, if you will. 

But all the rarer gaps I've yet to fill 

And others in condition are below 

The standard that I yet intend to show ; 

Then I shall search for mintmarks, since in these 

Alone can modern coinage surely please, 

And keep an eye to patterns, gem by gem ; 

Have you, sir, ever chanced to study them?" 

"Study to hell," the mouth behind the mask 

Concisely said. "Pray, what is it you ask," 

224 



The startled Doctor uttered. "Just shell out 
Your halves and quarters. Mind what you're 

about, 
And now, unless you want to lay there cold, 
Get onto somethin' in the way of gold." 
"But I have nothing even scarce in that," 
The Doctor said, as in the burglar's hat 
He poured the halves and quarters he had kept 
From circulation for a start. There crept 
A bitter pang of unmismatic shame 
At such confession. "1 am not to blame. 
However," he remarked, "so far away 
From auctions and with little means to pay 
For coins of every series really rare. 
I feel that I can only give my care 
To minor coinage first, but later on 
These lesser pieces will not have alone 
My interest and study. Soon I'll take 
My silver up in earnest and shall make 
Each series strong in early dates and fine 
As may my funds permit, throughout the line. 
Then I shall turn to gold." "You cussed fool," 
The burglar said, "If you don't raise the pool 
With somethin' yellow now, I'll lay you straight. 
Get down to work, I haven't time to wait." 
"Why, all I have in gold," the Doctor cried, 
"Are five half eagles that I put aside 
Because the date was that when I was born. 
But it's a common one, and two are worn 
So as to be but very good and three 
Are somewhat scratched and nicked, as you will 

see. 
I hoped no visitor would know about 
Such specimens, but, if they'll help you out. 
Take them, and, if there's any thing you've got 
I need, why we can trade, or, if there's not, 
You can, no doubt, improve them by and by." 
This mild abstraction ended in a sigh. 
The burglar listened with a puzzled stare. 

225 



At length he said, "If you've the shiners there, 
Just chuck 'em in me hat and no more gab." 
The Doctor promptly did, then with a grab 
Jim took the lot and in a handkerchief 
Rolled up his plunder. Next, as for relief 
Of any doubt about the Doctor's word, 
The contents of remaining drawers he stirred 
About with clumsy fingers. "What be those ?" 
He asked. The Doctor hastened to disclose 
The fact that they were copper pieces called 
Colonials. "And them derned things ?" Appalled, 
The Doctor murmured they were Jersey cents, 
But uttered not a word about expense. 
"And these here?" "They are tokens." At the 

last, 
When sundry empty envelopes had passed 
Old Jimmy's brief inspection, he remained 
A moment in reflection, then exclaimed — 
"Well, Doc, I never felt so cussed mean 
At any job I've done. From what I'd seen 
I reckoned on a sweep that I could brag, 
A big jack pot of shinin' yellow swag, 
But, if the copper rot you've spread about 
In these here trays is all you've dickered out 
Of hefty envelopes and bundles stuck 
All over sealin' wax, and if such truck 
Has made you such a lot of letters write 
And kept you spoonin' on it half the night. 
And soaked you for that safe to keep it in. 
Why, either it looks like a kind of sin 
Agin men of my callin' or you be 
The greatest loon I think I ever see. 
I'm goin' now and, Doc, you'd better stay 
Just where you are 'til I get well away." 
With this, the burglar glided from the door 
And, fifteen minutes later, 'round the floor 
The doctor danced a hornpipe in delight 
That, after all the perils of the night. 
The precious sets that made his leisure sweet 
Were still his own, uninjured and complete. 

226 



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